Food Fight: "Perfect Storm" Brewing

The worldwide food crisis deepens, and it isn't just ethanol; drought in Australia, greater demand for meat, futures traders going long, cost of fuel for transport and fertilizer, it is all adding up.

'Perfect storm' brewing for food riots, UN warns The recent outbreak of food riots is a warning sign that rising food prices could cause unrest and instability across the world, the UN's top humanitarian official said yesterday. Combined with the negative impact of climate change and soaring fuel prices, a "perfect storm" is brewing for much of the world's population, said John Holmes, the United Nations undersecretary-general for humanitarian affairs and emergency relief co-ordinator. ::Associated Press

Biofuels go from saviour to villain: Four years ago, Dennis Avery warned that, as Western governments fell head over heels for biofuels, passing laws forcing consumers to buy them, "U.S. farmers, who should be exporting food to densely populated Asian countries with rising incomes, will instead turn their corn into ethanol . . . without benefit to the environment." ::National Post