I just finished reading comments from The World Bank that say “…the effect of biofuels on food prices has not been as large as originally thought, but that the use of commodities by financial investors (the so-called “financialization of commodities”) may have been partly responsible for the 2007/08 spike.”
The whole time I was reading it I kept hearing the Ghostly voice of Gilda Radner, of Saturday Night Live fame saying “Nevermind.”
Her character Emily Litella was an elderly woman with a hearing problem who made regular appearances on SNL’s Weekend Updateop-ed segment in the late 1970s. Attired in a frumpy dress and sweater, Litella was introduced with professional dignity by the news anchors, who could sometimes be seen cringing slightly in anticipation of the verbal faux pas they knew would follow.
After ranting in an outraged manner, the news anchor would point out she didn’t get the point to which Gilda would reply “Nevermind.”
The World Bank’s leaked” report in 2008 erroneously blamed biofuels for 75 percent of the commodity price spike. The authors of their most recent report conclude that it is unlikely biofuels played a significant role because they do not represent a large percentage of worldwide grain and oilseed use.
It really might have been nice to know this before the World cost the nation’s family farmers dearly in terms of public trust. More importantly, they left the public thinking we should reserve our corn for human food consumption alone. Given this market is mature and our corn yields are soaring, we must look to other markets to keep farmers profitable and viable. And the markets with the most growth potential are things like ethanol, biodegradable products and other industrial uses.
“In reversing course, this World Bank report reaffirms the marginal role biofuels play in world commodity and food prices,” said RFA President Bob Dinneen. “The RFA has long noted that ethanol production has continued to increase while corn prices have now returned to normal levels. Volatile oil prices, speculation, and adverse weather conditions all played far more significant roles in driving commodity prices to record and near record prices. This report should silence critics in the food processing industry, the livestock industry, on Capitol Hill, and anywhere else that sought to portray ethanol as the boogeyman. With this phony food and fuel discussion put behind us, perhaps a real conversation about America’s energy future can ensue.”
Well put Bob but I think the cow left the barn in regard to the damage the World Bank did with their previous faux pas. I wish Emily/Gilda was still around to tell American consumers “Nevermind.”
Dear New York Times…Your editorial today regarding corn-based ethanol is superficial, either uninformed or malicious, and a disservice to the citizens of this nation looking for real energy solutions we can implement today.
Before addressing some of the onerous points in your piece, please take a look at the attached photo. This is not from the BP spill in the Gulf but rather the latest incident in Michigan which has dumped a million gallons of oil into a river and is now 80 miles from polluting Lake Michigan. Oil is and always has been a loaded gun from an environmental perspective. From leaking tanks at service stations to oil tankers grounded on coral reefs in storms. No more explanation needed on this one.
However, perhaps the biggest point you fail to address is wind, coal, and geothermal don’t make your car go. Natural gas can be used as an automotive fuel but it too is not renewable and has other issues I won’t go into here today. Solar….I’ll race you with my bicycle.
Will ethanol be made from other sources some day? Undoubtedly. Other biomass sources show real potential and will come with the proper research and development, but corn-based technology and infrastructure is the very launching platform for this effort. Yet opponents would have us build our domestic energy house without a foundation.
Ethanol…dubious environmental benefit? Line up the hundreds of studies regarding ethanol, look at the funding sources and consider what is left. What you will find is a long trail of reputable scientists and institutions public, private and governmental that clearly shows the environmental benefits of ethanol.
When compared to petroleum especially, ethanol is a rock star in regard to cleaning the air, maintaining water quality, and soil management. On the oil side think tar sands.
Your reference to the land use issue is also comical. Incredible productivity on our existing corn acres is easily supplying the growing ethanol industry while also meeting the needs of other markets. And yield growth is accelerating.
And finally, I think we must aggressively pursue all forms of renewable, domestic energy given the finite nature of petroleum and do so in good conscience because of the legacy we stand to leave future generations. To suggest we put our entire energy investment in “maybe someday” sources while ignoring a viable and tested source like ethanol is shortsighted at best.
“In the last 50 years, generally speaking, people have become much more lax about their moral code concerning sex and much more restrictive about their moral code concerning food.” – Mary Eberstadt, author of “The Loser Letters”
“The New Food Puritans” is a fascinating article on a website I just found called “Truth in Food.” The post is great, but the full interview with author Mary Eberstadt is even better and well worth 22 minutes of your listening time. Besides being an author, Eberstadt is a research fellow at the Hoover Institution and consulting editor to the Institution’s bimonthly Policy Review
The post and interview are based on an essay Eberstadt wrote last year called “Is Food the New Sex?” which puts forth the premise that while modern society places no restrictions on sexual behaviors – anything goes because it is just “personal choice” – today’s new moralists are instead judgmental about the food choices people make. That is, we have mindless sex but mindful eating. “I find it really interesting that these two codes, one about food and one about sex, seem to be existing in this inverse relationship, where as one gets stricter the other gets more lenient,” she says in the interview.
Very interesting theory put forth by a very intelligent lady with strong conservative Christian values. There is some other great stuff on the “Truth in Food” website worth a read – like “The Ten Reasons Why They Hate You So” – They being the anti-production agriculture movement and You being – farmers. Be sure to read the comments on that one too – seemed to touch a pretty raw nerve with some folks! You can also find Truth in Food on Facebook. Thanks to my friend Ray Bowman with the Kentucky Sheep and Goat Development Office for pointing me in their direction!
In yesterday’s blog I briefly discussed the phenomenon of editorials on an identical subject suddenly showing up in newspapers across the country almost like a flu epidemic had simultaneously hit newsrooms nationwide.
The most recent attack on corn-based ethanol provides a great example of how these coordinated efforts are staged. The current outbreak, which began Sunday, hit the nation’s top tier opinion leaders on Sunday and Monday and began showing up in large regional daily newspapers like the Des Moines Register and the Columbus Dispatch the last two days. Many local papers can be expected to jump on the passing train by week’s end bringing yet another 6 day ethanol drubbing to an end.
Editorials like this don’t happen in a vacuum, especially the main Op-ed pieces with no names attached because they represent the “official opinion” of the newspaper. In fact most editorial writers rarely leave the paper to venture into the real world to form their very articulate opinions.
Most sit in their secluded offices each day and read others opinions, research the internet and read other papers trolling for ideas. However, most also hold court each day where the powerful and the influential come calling with their hat in their hand and try to persuade the editor to write a piece reflecting their position.
If you happen to work at a large East Coast news outlet you have a tremendous amount of power because these folks generally start all news cycles and take the lead on deciding which issues get ink or airtime. Some people (yes, I know a few) make a good living professionally coaching CEOs in business and even government officials on how to best present and sell their message. Most have a news background and they use their contacts to grant attain access for others and grease the skids for their client.
Why would someone go to such great lengths and even spend huge sums on Public Relations/Public Affairs companies to help them hone their talking points and put together professional information packets? Because if you hit a home run with someone like the Wall Street Journal or the Washington Post, competing editors elsewhere will scramble to get something out as soon as possible and hope nobody notices they didn’t have it first. A sort of race begins. In this race it is ok to be second or even third but just like in the Olympics…nobody cares who got fourth place. (more…)
It seems that the attacks on corn commodities and corn ethanol will never stop. In a new report released last week called Green Scissors 2010, Friends of the Earth (aka FOE, how apropos) is calling for an end to subsidies in several areas including agriculture, biofuels, energy, infrastructure, and public lands.
Many of the recommendations of this report cut into corn ethanol from various angles. First, FOE calls for an end of government subsidies for commodity crops including corn. Next, they call for an end of ethanol subsidies, specifically the ethanol tax credit (VEETC) and the ethanol tariff. They do, however, acknowledge that the subsidies directly go to oil but indirectly help the ethanol and agricultural industry.
They write on their website, “Tens of billions of dollars of taxpayer money has already been wasted under the credit [VEETC]. And these funds do little more than to further line the coffers of the oil industry. This coalition is working to prevent an additional 30 billion plus dollars from being lavished on the industry to fulfill a legally mandated requirement to blend an environmentally harmful fuel into another environmentally harmful one.”
They argue that eliminating commodity crop subsidies by 50 percent could save taxpayers more than $26 billion over the next five years. They also argue that eliminating VEETC could save the U.S. Treasury as much as $5.4 billion in 2011.
If attacking the subsidy issue isn’t enough, they also attacked corn and corn ethanol on multiple environmental fronts including water quality (Dead Zone and hypoxia) as well as the ‘major’ amount of land that must be used to grow the crops. They go so far in the report to accuse corn-ethanol as being a bigger environmental offender than petroleum.
Corn ethanol may not be perfect, but I can’t stomach the false accusation that corn ethanol is environmentally worse than petroleum. But maybe the most frustrating thing is that not only is Friends of the Earth uneducated about agriculture and the corn ethanol industry, they don’t want to be. And in a world that is so “concerned” about the environment, FOE’s refusal to be open to non-fossil fuel options is a disservice to the American public.
My brother-in-law recently asked me why ethanol had a great reputation for two decades and suddenly seems to be getting pounded constantly, especially in editorial/opinion pages by the media.
He doesn’t have a farming background and isn’t invested in the ethanol industry so he is a neutral and somewhat uninformed observer. He is also one of the busiest guys I know so for him to notice it means the anti-ethanol crowd are now officially pervasive. Apparently, it’s not just me feeling paranoid.
The conversation came back to me in a hurry this week with the latest “ethanol is evil” Tsunami rolling across the country once again. It started with the Wall Street Journal (No link here because you have to pay for this tripe) and the Washington Post and worked its way across the country hitting the Chicago Tribune and Des Moines Register yesterday and likely making its way for the West Coast like some cheap traveling circus.
And like the aforementioned Circus the anti-ethanol gang leave a trail behind much like Barnum and Bailey’s elephants only there is no guy with a shovel and bucket cleaning up in their wake. They leave their load of “misinformation” to fester in the road in full knowledge that most people are also too busy to check the veracity of their propaganda.
The public lynching of ethanol began with the bogus food vs. fuel charade in 2008 and since then has continued to resurface over and over again in several different guises that get trotted out and recycled whenever opportunity presents itself.
Several things remain consistent as the attacks continue. The noxious cocktail they serve up is made with equal parts of the best bad science money can buy and poor logic. And the olive on the toothpick seems to be just plain old avarice.
That’s greed, materialism, or covetousness with a Capital “C.” The people fanning the fires of these attacks have rationale and motivation that are simple if not transparent. They are the folks that want the cheapest corn possible because it boosts their profits; want ethanol to be made from another source; or want ethanol crippled forever because the market share just got too big.
So, for the next couple of days come back here and you will get a sneak peak each day of some of these players and the Machiavellian games they play and fund all to snuff out the only real competition that imported petroleum faces in the marketplace today…ethanol.
Despite heavy rains and some brutal summer heat, the corn crop nationwide looks great.
According to the latest USDA report out this week, 72 percent of the crop is rated good to excellent, with a few more percentage points moving over to the excellent side. On the progress side, 84 percent of the crop is silking – compared to 70 percent average and 52 percent last year, and 17 percent is in the dough stage already, which is 10 points ahead of this time last year and a few points ahead of normal.
Only two of the major corn production states – Colorado and South Dakota – have not yet reached the halfway point in silking, according to USDA meteorologist Brad Rippey. “If you’re looking for problems with the corn, you’ll have to go to the fringes of the corn belt, well outside the major production zone,” he said. “In North Carolina, where it’s been very hot and dry, for example – 38 percent of the crop rated very poor to poor.”
The good-looking corn pictured here is growing near Bloomington – a photo taken recently by Tricia Braid-Terry of the Illinois Corn Growers’ staff. The good-looking young man in the the photo is her son, Ian. Thanks, Tricia!
A new kitty litter made from corn may not save the planet but it does present an educational opportunity. Corn is a versatile product used in thousands of products every day and the list keeps growing. The evolution from livestock feed to human food, to a growing list of industrial uses (ala corn kitty litter) is a natural one based on the staggering productivity of America’s family farmers.
So much focus is placed on the growing use of corn by the ethanol industry that I think we forget all the other products made from corn and how and why this expansive list of corn uses started. Today, nearly every state growing corn also sports a “checkoff program.” These farmer supported efforts take a small amount – from fractions of a cent to as much as a penny per bushel – from each bushel of corn sold to pay for promoting corn products, to increase exports markets and to research and develop new uses for corn.
Checkoffs changed the way people think. Corn suddenly became a chemical feedstock or stored solar energy just waiting to be released. Scientists and business entrepreneurs who thought the corn world revolved around sweet corn began to see unlimited potential for commercial corn.
As a result corn consumption for industrial or non-food uses has been outpacing the growth in food and feed uses for a long time. So it seems kind of silly that we continue to wring our hands over salacious debates over whether we should be using corn for things like fuel (ethanol) when it could be used for food and feed. This debate is ancient history and the market won. The advanced production power of U.S. agriculture today ensures a growing supply of corn that will continue to satisfy demand for domestic use and exports.
Today, there are more than 4,200 different uses for corn products ranging from toothpaste to paint. And just when you think you have heard of it all along comes the World’s Best Cat Litter™ is produced by GPC Pet Products in Muscatine, Iowa.
Developers say it is the only litter with a patented formula that harnesses the microporous power of whole-kernel corn to control odor better, absorb moisture faster, clump tighter, and last longer than all other litters—while providing a 100% renewable, 100% biodegradable cat litter that is pet, people, and planet safe.
And apparently it is safe for human consumption too, as one of the videos featured on the web site shows a gentleman eating the product to prove it is safe. Now that is grassroots marketing of a different kind.
Understanding why farmers started a self-administered checkoff programs is a little easier to grasp. Decades of $2 a bushel corn was a pretty good motivator. Corn grower’s productivity was crushing the prospects for profitability for the nation’s farmers as markets for livestock feed and domestic food uses matured.
Much like the sun coming up in the morning it is in farmer’s nature to try to produce as much corn as they can. Getting more bushels per acre has traditionally been the key to survival, so rather than throw in the towel they decided to be pro-active and build uses and markets. And the effort has paid off. Corn use continues to grow and so does farmers productivity. Seven of the largest corn crops in history have been grown in the last 7 years and without expanding acreage.
A 17 billion bushel crop is no longer a pipedream, but a looming reality so bring on the new uses.
The nation’s major fuel marketing associations are advocating legislation that will help them sell higher blends of renewable fuels, including ethanol and biodiesel greater than E10 or B5.
According to NACS, “the bill will enable retailers to have existing equipment evaluated and legally approved to sell new renewable fuels and will expedite the approval of new equipment. It also will protect retailers from Clean Air Act violations and liability associated with self-service consumers fueling unapproved engines with higher blends of renewable fuels.”
On the RFA blog, communications director Matt Hartwig said the legislation will help provide for a “seamless transition” to E15, whenever it is approved by EPA, “accelerating the adoption of E15 and the needed expansion of the ethanol market.”
The groups collectively sent a letter to Reps. Ross and Shimkus thanking them for their leadership in introducing the bill.
Reading a study from Iowa State University on the possibility of losing the ethanol tax credit got me thinking, and I have learned I’m not alone in my thoughts. First, there’s this line from the summary:
“Taxpayers would save more than $6 billion through elimination of the tax credit, or almost $7.00 per gallon of ethanol produced in excess of mandated amounts.”
First, ignore the fact that ISU does not explain the $7 per gallon adequately in its report. What does it mean to say that taxpayers would save? Which taxpayers? Are we all going to see a tax cut of some sort?
I don’t think so. In fact, the opposite is true. Removing a tax credit is a tax increase on those who used to receive the tax credit – and I’m sure they will pass it along to us consumers.
Perhaps that’s why the preceding sentence says this, as if it’s a good thing:
“Elimination of the tax credit would shift the burden of meeting mandates from taxpayers to blenders and consumers.”
“Ah, note that the change will ‘shift the burden’ from taxpayers to consumers and blenders who are, uh, taxpayers. The study does not say that the cost of producing ethanol, or fossil fuels that replace additional ethanol, will go down. Simply that the burden for producing energy will shift. That’s not quite the same thing as a savings.”
Eliminating these tax credits will give the government more money to spend elsewhere. It’s as simple as that. And removing the ethanol tax credit and the tariff will benefit foreign ethanol over domestic ethanol. That’s why this report was funded by foreign energy interests.
I just finished reading comments from The World Bank that say “…the effect of biofuels on food prices has not been as large as originally thought, but that the use of commodities by financial investors (the so-called “financialization of commodities”) may have been partly responsible for the 2007/08 spike.” 
According to the latest 
