Be it a bushel of wheat from Kansas, a ton of rice from India or a barrel of crude from Saudi Arabia, prices for all manner of commodities are on the rise across the globe, a trend that is starting to pinch consumers.Copper prices in particular have surged about 50% since June, reaching US $9,091 a tonne on news that JP Morgan had bought up more than half the copper on the London Metals Exchange (LME).Prices of many other raw materials continue to surge, with gold, silver, cotton and sugar reaching record highs. The effects are rippling from financial trading floors to local stores, forcing consumers to shell out more for everyday basics – a cup of coffee, a box of cereal, a gallon of gasoline.Those increases are being driven in part by short supplies of some crops and raw materials caused by poor weather i free guitar lessons n major producing regions and robust demand from emerging markets such as China and India. Investors and speculators also are pushing up prices as they jump into rising commodity markets. They are being drawn to these so-called hard assets to hedge against inflation and the risk of further devaluation of the dollar and other paper currencies.But that fear of inflation could ultimately be the fuel that feeds it, analysts warned. Billions of dollars are moving into oil, and then it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. This year alone, raw coffee prices on commodity exchanges are up 60%. Corn and soybeans, the basic feed for hogs and cattle, have risen 39% and 26%, respectively. Wheat, a dietary staple for many cultures, is up 33%, and sugar is up 23%. Crude oil prices are up 9% this year to nearly $87 a barrel.