Quite a few commentators in Albion have begun to wonder whether the floor of this dastardly depressive economic well is about to be reached. With only a candle to see in the chasm of this black hole they feel about, fumbling for the blessed green shoots of ‘recovery in the darkness. Let’s leave aside the infamy of trying to return to a 2006 dominated by casino gamblers and the madness of their corrupt type of capitalism force-fed upon us.

Is the bottom here? The sages (who, almost to a man) see the return of credit slightly in the money markets. They see a slight increase in mortgage lending. They see that investors may just be feeling that is the right time to buy back. A thin smile can be seen on  their faces. Unfortunately (or fortunately) they are like canaries in a mine who, bless, are feeling a bit light headed.

The bottom is not here. They do not understand that the ‘growth’ of the last few years was fuelled by debt. This debt fuelled demand but they do not recognise debt as a part of demand. So they ignore the decline in debt and thus credit that driven the fake growth of the last few years. As the debt-financing declines so unemployment rises. Without the debt financing a lot of the economic organs in our economy are clottted with debris of credit gluttony. Worse still, because we have abandoned creativity for financial gambling in the UK, we lack the capacity to engage in productive innovation that may lead to real recovery. Only when we realise that we can’t go back to 2006 and more importantly, we do not wish to, will the real seeds of economic recovery be planted.

In the mean time, enjoy the chocolate before it melts like the confidence we have in our financial system.

Currently living and studying in Britain, I often see quite an unpleasant and sight on the streets: nearly full packets of crisps, bags of chips thrown straight onto the pavement, young guys and girls dumping barely bitten sandwiches into bins - all just because they bought this food and do not want it. Coming from a country where people spend as much as half of their wage on food, I am greatly surprised by this: how come the British youth do not value food at all? Britain is a blessed country: people have not seen hunger here for many generations, yet it might see it very soon.

Currently, Britain’s food consumption is 6 times higher than its land and see can provide, warns Chatham House. There has been a proposal put forward about the creation of a special food policy council, which would regulate the prices and supply of the products consumed by the majority of general public. In short, it means adieu personal preference. There are more and more talks about food crisis in Britain.

As revealed by WRAP research, each year 3.6 tonnes of food is binned in England and Wales. That amounts to around £9bn of waste. Moreover, according to WRAP, 60% of the food is still in sealed package. These figures are merely baffling - especially as the food prices grow and are not going to stop soon: draughts brought about by climate change, agricultural subsidies for Bio-fuel crop farming and the current economic situation will contribute to inflation. The UN warns that by 2017 the price of red meat will have grown by 20-30%, rice - by 30%, wheat and corn - by 40-60% and cooking oil - by 80%.

If you think that the price crisis will only affect the poor and under-developed countries in Africa or Latin America, you are painfully wrong. As reported by Associated Press, in the USA, the richest state in the world, the number of children facing malnutrition or starvation has reached 36.2mln in 2007 - …% of the population. As it has been shown by numerous examples in history, crises are not aware of national boundaries: the world has become too small and inter-dependent to ignore the events happening even thousands of miles away from your home in Berkshire.

What is more, even disregarding the threat of the food crisis, the British population is already paying dearly for its reckless attitude towards food. Firstly, you spend your hard-earned cash on food you will not eat; then, you pay for a costly process of food waste recycling, and finally, with the rest of the world, you bear the environmental costs.

These facts make one reflect on our society’s behaviour and mind-set. By 2017, many of my generation will have children of their own, who will also have to eat something. The words “Dig for Victory” come to my mind - a slogan of WWII, calling Britons to farm their own food on allotments. Seems like we all may have to live by this slogan once more; perhaps, in a battle even with even greater enemy - hunger.