Central America hands out cash to stall food crisis

Central American governments are handing out cash and fertilizers and buying up grains from farmers to prevent rising food prices from pushing millions into deeper hunger and poverty.

Guatemala, where one of every two children is already malnourished, is giving emergency money to thousands of women in the poorest areas to buy food for their families. 

El Salvador is passing out hybrid corn seeds to increase production and Nicaragua is buying crops and selling them cheaply to consumers whose small incomes are stretched by rising prices. 

Central America, torn by civil wars in the 1980s and still the poorest region of Latin America, hopes to avoid the type of violent protests over spiraling prices now plaguing nations from Cameroon to Bangladesh. … more>>