Some analysts are predicting that the commodity price boom of the new millennium is something that has played itself out. Except for shale gas and its downward pressure on U.S. natural gas prices, however, natural resource-based commodity prices have remained high by historical records in the last few years, despite the feebleness of the recent global economic recovery.
In recent decades, Least Developed Countries (LDCs) have been using their natural-resources as collateral to access sources of finance for investment, countervailing the barriers they face when accessing conventional bank lending and capital markets. Depending on whom you ask, such financing models have been alternately vilified and sanctified in the global development debate.
Commodity prices are experiencing a lot of volatility right now, with food and oil prices nearing record highs. But what about the medium-term? The answer is fundamental for developing countries as commodity prices will be the key external variable for them to watch—perhaps even more than interest rates. Commodity prices are expected to stay high until at least 2015, before supply responses and lower relative demand by a burgeoning global middle-class moderate them.
