Ah-yup

[chelidon]

The most shocking line in this quite excellent article about the sudden and continuing jump in food prices worldwide is this:


This year biofuels will take a third of America's (record) maize harvest. That affects food markets directly: fill up an SUV's fuel tank with ethanol and you have used enough maize to feed a person for a year.

Ethanol from corn is not "green," is not sustainable, is not good for the environment or people, and is a big boondoggle perpetuated by the government in the interest of appeasing megafarms and trying to look like they're doing something to get the U.S. off dependence on fossil fuels while not actually doing much of anything at all. We need real solutions, not illusory soundbites and bogus plans that actually seriously hurt people (especially poor people) and don't do squat to solve the real problems.

And food prices will keep going up and up as oil prices continue to rise, because our "modern" farming, food processing/production, and distribution systems completely depend on huge quantities of cheap oil to keep it all running.


The end of cheap food
Dec 6th 2007
From The Economist print edition

Rising food prices are a threat to many; they also present the world with an enormous opportunity
http://www.economist.com/opinion/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10252015

(excerpt, full article at link above)
FOR as long as most people can remember, food has been getting cheaper and farming has been in decline. In 1974-2005 food prices on world markets fell by three-quarters in real terms. Food today is so cheap that the West is battling gluttony even as it scrapes piles of half-eaten leftovers into the bin.

That is why this year's price rise has been so extraordinary. Since the spring, wheat prices have doubled and almost every crop under the sun—maize, milk, oilseeds, you name it—is at or near a peak in nominal terms. The Economist's food-price index is higher today than at any time since it was created in 1845 (see chart). Even in real terms, prices have jumped by 75% since 2005. No doubt farmers will meet higher prices with investment and more production, but dearer food is likely to persist for years (see article). That is because “agflation” is underpinned by long-running changes in diet that accompany the growing wealth of emerging economies—the Chinese consumer who ate 20kg (44lb) of meat in 1985 will scoff over 50kg of the stuff this year. That in turn pushes up demand for grain: it takes 8kg of grain to produce one of beef.

But the rise in prices is also the self-inflicted result of America's reckless ethanol subsidies. This year biofuels will take a third of America's (record) maize harvest. That affects food markets directly: fill up an SUV's fuel tank with ethanol and you have used enough maize to feed a person for a year. And it affects them indirectly, as farmers switch to maize from other crops. The 30m tonnes of extra maize going to ethanol this year amounts to half the fall in the world's overall grain stocks.

Comments

[america-divine.livejournal.com]

I've been following some of this, partly because they're pushing wood-based ethanol in forestry (I now work in an academic forestry unit, and they're very much under the direct sway of industry). The wood stuff isn't nearly as bad for people or ag land as the corn stuff, BUT it will make traditional clear cuts look eco-friendly. The idea is to "harvest" absolutely everything--small diameter trees, even saw dust--anything they regard as "detritus"--and turn it into ethanol. They'll no doubt attempt to replace the clearer clear cuts with monocultured tracts.

Used to be they only wanted big trees... then they got a use for pulp and clear cutting started ... now this.

[america-divine.livejournal.com]

Here's a recent piece on wood-based ethanol:
http://earthmeanders.blogspot.com/2008/03/burning-forests-to-feed-cars.html

[anthologie.livejournal.com]

That goes along with this:

http://anthologie.livejournal.com/1165828.html

[chelidon.livejournal.com]

mmm, yes. Exactly. "Green" often isn't, and everything has a cost. That's why the studies showing low, or in some cases actually negative net return on energy investment in corn-based biofuel, are so important to consider. With the solar, the whole process has to be taken into account.... But whether petro or "green," as a species we just can't seem to get away from the frontier mentality. And now, there's no new frontier left to move to, and no big pot of cheap, clean energy just waiting for us. We're going to have to change, drastically, and I don't know if we can do it soon enough. We'll see...

[roy-batty.livejournal.com]

Also, ethanol use produces more in the way of carbon emissions that does normal gasoline.

And, all the HFCF is making us (as a nation) fat, and giving us diabetes.

And, cows were never designed to eat corn, When they eat grass, they take in and transfer CLA to us (which helps with metabolism, and with warding off cancer). This doesn't happen with corn-fed cows.

It's all Reagan's fault - I'm not kidding.

Prior to the Reagan administration, corn subsidies worked to leverage free-market dynamics. When prices were too low, farmers were paid to NOT grow corn. This resulted in less corn, which means prices went up, and eventually the free market effect stabilized itself. Also, the farmers were free to grow other grops, allowing for healthy diversity. During the Reagan years - this changed. With the battle cry "paying them to not grow anything is stupid", they changed the system so that the same money artificially made (and to this day keeps) the price of corn ridiculously cheap. Companies wanting to find new and inventive ways to capitalize on this endless supply of cheap corn directly led to many of the evils we deal with today: New Formula Coke (which was the turning point between cane sugar, and HFCF), 2 Litre bottles and Thirsty-two ouncers (and other supersizes) of soda drinks (they were too expensive before, and the human body couldn't consume all that liquid without the HFCF's power to turn off your body's ability to know it's full - NOT kidding), all the myriad health effects of this shift, the monoculturing of farms allowing for agribusiness to more efficiently drive off small farmers, and of course without this artificially cheap corn supply Ethanol (which *is* effectively a - horridly inefficient - fossil fuel, given all the petro used in fertilizers, pesticides, and harvesting) would and could never have been.

And the New Coke thing still kills me.

[eeedge.livejournal.com]

"...fill up an SUV's fuel tank with ethanol and you have used enough maize to feed a person for a year."

Of course, the maize used for ethanol isn't the same maize used for food. I don't know how much food-grade maize you could grow on the same land, or what the comparable soil damage would be, though.

The things you learn working for 4-H. Before working for 4-H in Illinois, I didn't know that a beef cow must NEVER be confused with a dairy cow.

[chelidon.livejournal.com]

Yep, good point -- feed corn is feed corn, which of course affects prices for livestock (meat and dairy), but doesn't literally come out of anyone's mouth. I'm not sure what the range of maize varieties is that they can use for ethanol -- but while not as direct (or dramatic) a relationship, every acre planted (or used) for ethanol is an acre not used for something else, like soy, etc. (and I've heard of increasing amounts of re-planting going on), so ethanol is having a significant affect on foods prices, just a step or so removed...

[jennlynn-green.livejournal.com]

Whatever the supposed threat — the lack of food security, rural poverty, environmental stewardship — the world seems to have only one solution: government intervention.

That's a scary thought...

Given recent trends, I am really hoping that more people are going to begin to become aware about food; how food impacts us as individuals and as a planet. Perhaps then we will all take responsibility for things like the Farm Bill, rather than looking away from those issues because they are "not our problem". I don't think we can sit back and wait for the government to "fix" the corrupt food systems which are currently in place in our society and I hope we can all begin to look for ways that our voices can be heard around food issues in our world.

But then I'm preaching to the choir, no? Thanks for the article!

[chelidon.livejournal.com]

Sure thing, and testify, sister! :)

I am encouraged by the local food initiatives in Vermont and New Hampshire, where obsolete or unwise laws which over-regulated local food production are being rolled back, allowing small local farms to sell direct to local businesses and consumers more easily, and products like raw milk are starting to become available as well (or at least things are moving in that direction).

I suspect that one of the impacts of Peak Oil will be more local food production (by necessity). The last 50 years have seen increasing consolidation of food production into larger and larger companies, but it's just possible that small farming may become a growth area in the next 50 years....