“It seems so obvious: With so much corn being turned into fuel, food shortages must inevitably result, and biofuel programs must be the cause. However, that’s completely untrue.”
The increased demand for food from the hundreds of millions of people in China and India rising out of poverty and moving to a more calorie-rich diet affects the price of food the most. Second is the price of fuel.
The editorial is written by “Energy Victory” author Robert Zubrin and Gal Luft, executive director of the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security, both members of the Set America Free Coalition which is concerned about the national security and economic implications of America’s growing dependence on foreign oil.
They rightly note that the real culprit in high food prices is the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries. “This year, with OPEC-rigged oil prices exceeding $100 a barrel, the U.S. will pay $800 billion for its oil supply, and the world as a whole will pay $3.2 trillion. These figures are both up a factor of 10 from what they were in 1999 and represent a huge regressive tax on the world economy.”
So, rather than shut down biofuel programs, we need to radically augment them, to the point where we can take down the oil cartel. Congress can make this happen by passing a law requiring that all new cars sold in the U.S. be flex-fuel vehicles that can run on any combination of gasoline, ethanol or methanol. The technology costs only about $100 per vehicle.
They conclude, “That, and not blindly accepting the naysayers’ propaganda demanding the preservation of the oil monopoly, should be our course.”
Thanks to Mark Lambert with the Illinois Corn Growers for sending us the story.
Why are food prices on the increase? Illinois Farm Bureau has created a new website to provide consumers with the proper answers. Farmingforyou.org discusses and explains the five major reasons food prices are on the rise.
National Corn Growers Association CEO Rick Tolman offered testimony in support of the national Renewable Fuels Standard during a hearing Tuesday before the House Subcommittee on Energy and Air Quality.
“This policy has been critical to the growth and economic development of rural America and has added value to our product which for so long has been priced below the cost of production,” Tolman told the subcommittee.
“Recently many critics have questioned the value and consequences of the Renewable Fuels Standard, they are quick to point to biofuels as the primary reason for global food increases,” said Tolman. “A look at the facts surrounding food prices simply doesn’t support that logic. The effects of $120 a barrel oil have far more reaching effects on consumer prices for food. Petroleum is used in virtually every step of the supply chain that begins with the farmer and ends at the consumer’s table. In fact, just 19 cents of every consumer dollar can be attributed to the actual cost of farm products.”
One of the benefits of the Internet is that traditional media can use it for projects that just don’t technologically fit with their format. Here’s a fascinating example from the New York Times, especially when we’re looking at this debate over food prices.
You can drill down into each piece of this pie chart, wherein you learn that fuel prices have increased much more dramatically between 2007 and 2008 than food prices. And the chart itself says … “The high price of oil is a factor that has made food prices rise quickly.”
Along with this clever illustration, Carey makes the point that corn ethanol “isn’t quite the villain critics make it out to be,” especially with regard to food prices.
“Biofuels are a very, very small factor” in rising food costs, says David Morris, vice-president of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, a nonprofit group that tries to strengthen communities politically and economically around the world. Absent corn ethanol, food prices would still be up dramatically because of soaring global demand, fast-rising prices for oil and natural gas used to make fertilizer, and climatic factors such as Australia’s drought. It’s also worth noting that these high crop prices save taxpayers billions of dollars in reduced subsidies to farmers—far more than is spent to subsidize ethanol.
Certainly, a rapid rise in food prices brings misery to poor countries. But over the long haul, “it’s not obvious that high grain prices are inherently bad,” asserts Nathanael Greene, senior policy analyst at the Natural Resources Defense Council. Years of cheap, subsidized grain in the U.S. and Europe have left farmers in the developing world unable to compete. They can’t invest in better seed, machinery, or cultivation practices (page 26). As a result, global average yields for corn, wheat, and rice are less than half what the world’s top 10% of farmers achieve. While American corn farmers produce 150 bushels per acre, farms in the developing world often get only 30. “If there is a crime against humanity, it is these low yields,” not biofuels, says Richard Hamilton, CEO of Ceres Inc., a Thousand Oaks (Calif.) startup developing biofuel crops. Those low yields will improve if farmers make more money. In the long term, “high prices will lead these countries to produce more of their own food,” says Morris, easing the supply shortages.
Lots more in this balanced article - read it yourself here - and add your voice to the comments, many of which continue to be anti-corn ethanol.
That’s the question National Corn Growers CEO Rick Tolman presented to the media during a press conference in Washington DC on Wednesday, pointing to the front page article on ethanol and corn prices in the Washington Post as being the latest example of making ethanol out to be the ax murderer. “There’s a lot of misinformation, slanted information that is just inaccurate,” Tolman said. “While we do have some role in higher food prices in the corn industry, we are certainly closer to Little Bo Peep than the ax murderer.”
Tolman pointed out the importance of the US corn industry, the dramatic increases in yields and production and the fact that prices for petroleum products have a much greater impact on food prices than corn does.
“What do corn prices have to do with food riots in China and Pakistan and India over rice?” Tolman asked. “Absolutely nothing. There is no connection to rice production around the world with biofuels production in the United States. Absolutely none.”
Tolman blamed the disinformation in the media on a very clever marketing campaign by those with deep pockets. “If you want to know who the real ax murderer is slashing our grocery food budget, look at $4 a gallon gasoline, look at $120 a barrel oil,” Tolman said.
The media was very interested in hearing the story that agriculture and the ethanol industry had to tell about food prices during a press conference Wednesday at the National Press Club.
Former Agriculture Secretary John Block, National Corn Growers CEO Rick Tolman, National Farmers Union president Tom Buis and Renewable Fuels Association CEO Bob Dinneen gave opening statements about the facts on food price increases and entertained about 40 minutes of questions from reporters present and on the phone. They covered nearly every topic on the food and fuel waterfront and gave highly informative answers to probing and intelligent questions from the press. Hopefully this will translate into some balance in reporting about the food versus fuel issue.
Listen to the entire one hour plus press conference here:
Ken McCauley of White Cloud, Kansas says the figures used in the article published in Sunday’s Kansas City Star, for example, were too vague. He says they didn’t properly represent real data and were spun in such a way to make ethanol a culprit… a culprit of rising food prices, rising gas prices and lower fuel economy.
Laura McNamara was at the Roadrunner Turbo Indy 300 Sunday and did an excellent interview with Ken that you can listen to here:
Ken is pictured here with Team Ethanol Driver Ryan Hunter-Reay, Ethanol Promotion and Information Council Executive Director Toni Nuernberg and EPIC Director of Operations Robert White.
In 1949, the price of corn averaged $1.24 per bushel. Last Wednesday (as of 9:05 a.m. Eastern Time), corn futures were going for $6.13 per bushel on the commodities market.
That’s an increase of 394 percent in 59 years.
Now compare that to oil.
In 1949, it averaged $2.54 per barrel. On Wednesday (at the same moment), it was going for $113.70 per barrel.
That’s an increase of 4,376 percent in the same 59 years.
Back on April 7, Michael Ramirez of Investor’s Business Daily won the Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Cartoons. Among the works in his portfolio was this:
Interestingly, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch ran this cartoon in today’s paper:
The similarities are striking. The logic is grievously flawed. There’s little to no connection between ethanol and food supply or prices. Read these reports for more information:
The editorial is written by “Energy Victory” author Robert Zubrin and Gal Luft, executive director of the Institute for the Analysis of Global Security, both members of the Set America Free Coalition which is concerned about the national security and economic implications of America’s growing dependence on foreign oil. 
“This policy has been critical to the growth and economic development of rural America and has added value to our product which for so long has been priced below the cost of production,” Tolman told the subcommittee.
Along with this clever illustration, Carey makes the point that corn ethanol “isn’t quite the villain critics make it out to be,” especially with regard to food prices.
That’s the question National Corn Growers CEO Rick Tolman presented to the media during a press conference in Washington DC on Wednesday, pointing to the 
The media was very interested in hearing the story that agriculture and the ethanol industry had to tell about food prices during a press conference Wednesday at the National Press Club.
The recent criticism of ethanol doesn’t sit too well with the chairman of the 
