Record increases in food prices are again threatening to push millions of people in Asia's developing countries into extreme poverty, a report released Tuesday in Manila by the Asian Development Bank warned.

The ADB report, titled "Global Food Price Inflation and Developing Asia", said that if the global food and oil price hikes seen in early 2011 persist for the remainder of the year, economic growth in the region could be reduced by up to 1.5 percentage points.

"Fast and persistent increases" in prices of many Asian food staples since the middle of 2010, coupled with crude oil reaching a 31-month high in March this year, are "a serious setback for the region which has rebounded rapidly and strongly from the global economic crisis," the report said.

The report, released ahead of the ADB annual governors' meeting next week in Hanoi, Vietnam, said that if the global food and oil price hikes seen in early 2011 persist for the remainder of the year, economic growth in the region, home to 3.3 billion people, could be reduced by up to 1.5 percentage points.

"Left unchecked, the food crisis will badly undermine recent gains in poverty reduction made in Asia," ADB chief economist Changyong Rhee said.

The statement echoed similar warnings made on April 14 by World Bank president Robert B. Zoellick that "more people could become poor because of high and volatile prices."

Driven in part by higher fuel costs connected to events in the Middle East and North Africa, global food prices are 36 percent above their levels a year ago and remain volatile, pushing people deeper into poverty, the World Bank said in Washington earlier in releasing findings by its Food Price Watch.

The World Bank report said a further 10 percent increase in global prices could drive an additional 10 million people below the $1.25 extreme poverty line.

"A 30 percent price hike could lead to 34 million more poor," the World Bank said.

The ADB chief economist said that "for poor families in developing Asia, who already spend more than 60 percent of their income on food, higher food prices further reduce their ability to pay for medical care and their children's education."

Domestic food inflation in many regional economies in Asia has averaged 10 percent in early 2011, and the ADB study said that a 10 percent rise in domestic food prices in developing Asia "could push an additional 64 million people into extreme poverty based on the $1.25 a day poverty line."

Grain stocks have fallen, the ADB noted as it projected that the pattern of higher and more volatile food prices is likely to continue over the short term.

The ADB report pointed to a "need to calm speculative activities in food markets." It recommends enhanced market integration, and the elimination of policy distortions that create hurdles in transferring food from surplus to deficit regions.

Cooperation between Asian nations can help better secure food supply for the region's people, the ADB report said further.

Citing an example of a positive step in that direction, the report said the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations has agreed, through the ASEAN Integrated Food Security Framework, to establish an emergency regional rice reserve system.

- J. Galang