Pelosi Demands Five Fold Ethanol Production Increases : World Food Riots Ensue

[babeejm]

On Apr 15, 3:11 pm, "Barack Hamas Osama" <Osama @Democrats.org>
wrote:
> http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/15/business/worldbusiness/15food.html?...
> &en=9e715f242c497f48&ex=1208923200&partner=MYWAY&pagewanted=print
>
> April 15, 2008
> News Analysis
> Fuel Choices, Food Crises and Finger-Pointing
> By ANDREW MARTIN
> The idea of turning farms into fuel plants seemed, for a time, like one of
> the answers to high global oil prices and supply worries. That strategy
> seemed to reach a high point last year when DEMOCRAT PELOSI CONTROLLED
> Congress mandated a fivefold increase in the use of biofuels.
>
> But now a reaction is building against policies in the United States and
> Europe to promote ethanol and similar fuels, with political leaders from
> poor countries contending that these fuels are driving up food prices and
> starving poor people. Biofuels are fast becoming a new flash point in global
> diplomacy, putting pressure on Western politicians to reconsider their
> policies, even as they argue that biofuels are only one factor in the
> seemingly inexorable rise in food prices.
>
> In some countries, the higher prices are leading to riots, political
> instability and growing worries about feeding the poorest people. Food riots
> contributed to the dismissal of Haiti's prime minister last week, and
> leaders in some other countries are nervously trying to calm anxious
> consumers.
>
> At a weekend conference in Washington, finance ministers and central bankers
> of seven leading industrial nations called for urgent action to deal with
> the price spikes, and several of them demanded a reconsideration of biofuel
> policies adopted recently in the West.
>
> Many specialists in food policy consider government mandates for biofuels to
> be ill advised, agreeing that the diversion of crops like corn into fuel
> production has contributed to the higher prices. But other factors have
> played big roles, including droughts that have limited output and rapid
> global economic growth that has created higher demand for food.
>
> That growth, much faster over the last four years than the historical norm,
> is lifting millions of people out of destitution and giving them access to
> better diets. But farmers are having trouble keeping up with the surge in
> demand.
>
> While there is agreement that the growth of biofuels has contributed to
> higher food prices, the amount is disputed.
>
> Work by the International Food Policy Research Institute in Washington
> suggests that biofuel production accounts for a quarter to a third of the
> recent increase in global commodity prices. The Food and Agriculture
> Organization of the United Nations predicted late last year that biofuel
> production, assuming that current mandates continue, would increase food
> costs by 10 to 15 percent.
>
> Ethanol supporters maintain that any increase caused by biofuels is
> relatively small and that energy costs and soaring demand for meat in
> developing countries have had a greater impact. "There's no question that
> they are a factor, but they are really a smaller factor than other things
> that are driving up prices," said Ron Litterer, an Iowa farmer who is
> president of the National Corn Growers Association.
>
> He said biofuels were an "easy culprit to blame" because their popularity
> had grown so rapidly in the last two or three years.
>
> Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, called the recent criticism
> of ethanol by foreign officials "a big joke." He questioned why they were
> not also blaming a drought in Australia that reduced the wheat crop and the
> growing demand for meat in China and India.
>
> "You make ethanol out of corn," he said. "I bet if I set a bushel of corn in
> front of any of those delegates, not one of them would eat it."
>
> The senator's comments reflect a political reality in Washington that
> despite the criticism from abroad, support for ethanol remains solid.
>
> Representative Jim McGovern, Democrat of Massachusetts, said he had come to
> realize that Congress made a mistake in backing biofuels, not anticipating
> the impact on food costs. He said Congress needed to reconsider its policy,
> though he acknowledged that would be difficult.
>
> "If there was a secret vote, there is a pretty large number of people who
> would like to reassess what we are doing," he said.
>
> According to the World Bank, global food prices have increased by 83 percent
> in the last three years. Rice, a staple food for nearly half the world's
> population, has been a particular focus of concern in recent weeks, with
> spiraling prices prompting several countries to impose drastic limits on
> exports as they try to protect domestic consumers.
>
> While grocery prices in the United States increased about 5 percent over all
> in the last year, some essential items like eggs and milk have jumped far
> more. The federal government is expected to release new data on domestic
> food prices Wednesday, with notable increases expected.
>
> On Monday, President Bush ordered that $200 million in emergency food aid be
> made available to "meet unanticipated food aid needs in Africa and
> elsewhere," a White House statement said.
>
> His spokeswoman, Dana M. Perino, said the president had urged officials to
> look for additional ways to help poor nations combat food insecurity and to
> come up with a long-term plan "that helps take care of the world's poor and
> hungry."
>
> Skeptics have long questioned the value of diverting food crops for fuel,
> and the grocery and live- stock industries vehemently opposed an energy bill
> last fall, arguing it was driving up costs.
>
> A fifth of the nation's corn crop is now used to brew ethanol for motor
> fuel, and as farmers have planted more corn, they have cut acreage of other
> crops, particularly soybeans. That, in turn, has contributed to a global
> shortfall of cooking oil.
>
> Spreading global dissatisfaction in recent months has intensified the
> food-versus-fuel debate. Last Friday, a European environment advisory panel
> urged the European Union to suspend its goal of having 10 percent of
> transportation fuel made from biofuels by 2020. Europe's well-meaning rush
> to biofuels, the scientists concluded, had created a variety of harmful
> ripple effects, including deforestation in Southeast Asia and higher prices
> for grain.
>
> Even if biofuels are not the primary reason for the increase in food costs,
> some experts say it is one area where a reversal of government policy could
> help take pressure off food prices.
>
> C. Ford Runge, an economist at the University of Minnesota, said it is
> "extremely difficult to disentangle" the effect of biofuels on food costs.
> Nevertheless, he said there was little that could be done to mitigate the
> effect of droughts and the growing appetite for protein in developing
> countries.
>
> "Ethanol is the one thing we can do something about," he said. "It's about
> the only lever we have to pull, but none of the politicians have the courage
> to pull the lever."
>
> But August Schumacher, a former under secretary of agriculture who is a
> consultant for the Kellogg Foundation, said the criticism of biofuels might
> be misdirected. Development agencies like the World Bank and many
> governments did little to support agricultural development in the last two
> decades, he said.
>
> He noted that many of the upheavals over food prices abroad have concerned
> rice and wheat, neither of which is used as a biofuel. For both those crops,
> global demand has soared at the same time that droughts suppressed the
> output from farms.
>
> Elisabeth Rosenthal and Steven R. Weisman contributed reporting.
>
> Democrats Push Ethanol Growth
> House Democrats said yesterday that the answer to the fuel crisis is growing
> in the fields of rural America, and they introduced bills to expand
> production of ethanol.http://www.monsanto.co.uk/news/ukshowlib.phtml?uid=10304
>
> http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/americas/04/14/world.food.crisis/?i...
> ef=mpstoryemail
> Riots, instability spread as food prices skyrocket
> CNN) -- Riots from Haiti to Bangladesh to Egypt over the soaring costs of
> basic foods have brought the issue to a boiling point and catapulted it to
> the forefront of the world's attention, the head of an agency focused on
> global development said Monday.
>
> The finance ministers were in shock, almost in panic this weekend," he said
> on CNN's "American Morning," in a reference to top economic officials who
> gathered in Washington. "There are riots all over the world in the poor
> countries ... and, of course, our own poor are feeling it in the United
> States."
> "While many are worrying about filling their gas tanks, many others around
> the world are struggling to fill their stomachs, and it is getting more and
> more difficult every day," Zoellick said late last week in a speech opening
> meetings with finance ministers.
>
> Jean Ziegler, U.N. special rapporteur on the right to food, has called using
> food crops to create ethanol "a crime against humanity."
>
> "We've been putting our food into the gas tank -- this corn-to-ethanol
> subsidy which our government is doing really makes little sense," said
> Columbia University's Sachs.
>
> Former President Clinton, at a campaign stop for his wife in Pennsylvania
> over the weekend, said, "Corn is the single most inefficient way to produce
> ethanol because it uses a lot of energy and because it drives up the price
> of food."



>That is very interesting because last night there was news story about food shortages
in the world and where the food is going..now I know..it is being used
to power
our cars!!

 

[Barack Hamas Osama]

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/15/business/worldbusiness/15food.html?ei=5065
&en=9e715f242c497f48&ex=1208923200&partner=MYWAY&pagewanted=print

April 15, 2008
News Analysis
Fuel Choices, Food Crises and Finger-Pointing
By ANDREW MARTIN
The idea of turning farms into fuel plants seemed, for a time, like one of
the answers to high global oil prices and supply worries. That strategy
seemed to reach a high point last year when DEMOCRAT PELOSI CONTROLLED
Congress mandated a fivefold increase in the use of biofuels.

But now a reaction is building against policies in the United States and
Europe to promote ethanol and similar fuels, with political leaders from
poor countries contending that these fuels are driving up food prices and
starving poor people. Biofuels are fast becoming a new flash point in global
diplomacy, putting pressure on Western politicians to reconsider their
policies, even as they argue that biofuels are only one factor in the
seemingly inexorable rise in food prices.

In some countries, the higher prices are leading to riots, political
instability and growing worries about feeding the poorest people. Food riots
contributed to the dismissal of Haiti's prime minister last week, and
leaders in some other countries are nervously trying to calm anxious
consumers.

At a weekend conference in Washington, finance ministers and central bankers
of seven leading industrial nations called for urgent action to deal with
the price spikes, and several of them demanded a reconsideration of biofuel
policies adopted recently in the West.

Many specialists in food policy consider government mandates for biofuels to
be ill advised, agreeing that the diversion of crops like corn into fuel
production has contributed to the higher prices. But other factors have
played big roles, including droughts that have limited output and rapid
global economic growth that has created higher demand for food.

That growth, much faster over the last four years than the historical norm,
is lifting millions of people out of destitution and giving them access to
better diets. But farmers are having trouble keeping up with the surge in
demand.

While there is agreement that the growth of biofuels has contributed to
higher food prices, the amount is disputed.

Work by the International Food Policy Research Institute in Washington
suggests that biofuel production accounts for a quarter to a third of the
recent increase in global commodity prices. The Food and Agriculture
Organization of the United Nations predicted late last year that biofuel
production, assuming that current mandates continue, would increase food
costs by 10 to 15 percent.

Ethanol supporters maintain that any increase caused by biofuels is
relatively small and that energy costs and soaring demand for meat in
developing countries have had a greater impact. "There's no question that
they are a factor, but they are really a smaller factor than other things
that are driving up prices," said Ron Litterer, an Iowa farmer who is
president of the National Corn Growers Association.

He said biofuels were an "easy culprit to blame" because their popularity
had grown so rapidly in the last two or three years.

Senator Charles E. Grassley, Republican of Iowa, called the recent criticism
of ethanol by foreign officials "a big joke." He questioned why they were
not also blaming a drought in Australia that reduced the wheat crop and the
growing demand for meat in China and India.

"You make ethanol out of corn," he said. "I bet if I set a bushel of corn in
front of any of those delegates, not one of them would eat it."

The senator's comments reflect a political reality in Washington that
despite the criticism from abroad, support for ethanol remains solid.

Representative Jim McGovern, Democrat of Massachusetts, said he had come to
realize that Congress made a mistake in backing biofuels, not anticipating
the impact on food costs. He said Congress needed to reconsider its policy,
though he acknowledged that would be difficult.

"If there was a secret vote, there is a pretty large number of people who
would like to reassess what we are doing," he said.

According to the World Bank, global food prices have increased by 83 percent
in the last three years. Rice, a staple food for nearly half the world's
population, has been a particular focus of concern in recent weeks, with
spiraling prices prompting several countries to impose drastic limits on
exports as they try to protect domestic consumers.

While grocery prices in the United States increased about 5 percent over all
in the last year, some essential items like eggs and milk have jumped far
more. The federal government is expected to release new data on domestic
food prices Wednesday, with notable increases expected.

On Monday, President Bush ordered that $200 million in emergency food aid be
made available to "meet unanticipated food aid needs in Africa and
elsewhere," a White House statement said.

His spokeswoman, Dana M. Perino, said the president had urged officials to
look for additional ways to help poor nations combat food insecurity and to
come up with a long-term plan "that helps take care of the world's poor and
hungry."

Skeptics have long questioned the value of diverting food crops for fuel,
and the grocery and live- stock industries vehemently opposed an energy bill
last fall, arguing it was driving up costs.

A fifth of the nation's corn crop is now used to brew ethanol for motor
fuel, and as farmers have planted more corn, they have cut acreage of other
crops, particularly soybeans. That, in turn, has contributed to a global
shortfall of cooking oil.

Spreading global dissatisfaction in recent months has intensified the
food-versus-fuel debate. Last Friday, a European environment advisory panel
urged the European Union to suspend its goal of having 10 percent of
transportation fuel made from biofuels by 2020. Europe's well-meaning rush
to biofuels, the scientists concluded, had created a variety of harmful
ripple effects, including deforestation in Southeast Asia and higher prices
for grain.

Even if biofuels are not the primary reason for the increase in food costs,
some experts say it is one area where a reversal of government policy could
help take pressure off food prices.

C. Ford Runge, an economist at the University of Minnesota, said it is
"extremely difficult to disentangle" the effect of biofuels on food costs.
Nevertheless, he said there was little that could be done to mitigate the
effect of droughts and the growing appetite for protein in developing
countries.

"Ethanol is the one thing we can do something about," he said. "It's about
the only lever we have to pull, but none of the politicians have the courage
to pull the lever."

But August Schumacher, a former under secretary of agriculture who is a
consultant for the Kellogg Foundation, said the criticism of biofuels might
be misdirected. Development agencies like the World Bank and many
governments did little to support agricultural development in the last two
decades, he said.

He noted that many of the upheavals over food prices abroad have concerned
rice and wheat, neither of which is used as a biofuel. For both those crops,
global demand has soared at the same time that droughts suppressed the
output from farms.

Elisabeth Rosenthal and Steven R. Weisman contributed reporting.




Democrats Push Ethanol Growth
House Democrats said yesterday that the answer to the fuel crisis is growing
in the fields of rural America, and they introduced bills to expand
production of ethanol.
http://www.monsanto.co.uk/news/ukshowlib.phtml?uid=10304


http://edition.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/americas/04/14/world.food.crisis/?imw=Y&ir
ef=mpstoryemail
Riots, instability spread as food prices skyrocket
CNN) -- Riots from Haiti to Bangladesh to Egypt over the soaring costs of
basic foods have brought the issue to a boiling point and catapulted it to
the forefront of the world's attention, the head of an agency focused on
global development said Monday.

The finance ministers were in shock, almost in panic this weekend," he said
on CNN's "American Morning," in a reference to top economic officials who
gathered in Washington. "There are riots all over the world in the poor
countries ... and, of course, our own poor are feeling it in the United
States."
"While many are worrying about filling their gas tanks, many others around
the world are struggling to fill their stomachs, and it is getting more and
more difficult every day," Zoellick said late last week in a speech opening
meetings with finance ministers.

Jean Ziegler, U.N. special rapporteur on the right to food, has called using
food crops to create ethanol "a crime against humanity."

"We've been putting our food into the gas tank -- this corn-to-ethanol
subsidy which our government is doing really makes little sense," said
Columbia University's Sachs.

Former President Clinton, at a campaign stop for his wife in Pennsylvania
over the weekend, said, "Corn is the single most inefficient way to produce
ethanol because it uses a lot of energy and because it drives up the price
of food."