World food prices in seven-month dip, longest since 2009

World food prices tracked by the United Nations fell for a seventh month in October, the longest slide since 2009, adding to falling energy costs in slowing inflation and making nutrition more accessible.

An index of 55 food items fell 0.2% month-on-month to 192.3 points, the lowest since August 2010, the UN’s Rome-based Food & Agriculture Organization wrote in an online report. The index is stabilising, it said.

Food prices are falling amid an outlook for bigger grain crops, rising milk output as well as a recovery in US pork production. That is helping slow global inflation, already aided by a slump in oil prices, with Goldman Sachs forecasting world annual average consumer prices will rise 3.3% next year from 3.5% in 2014.