Increasing Biofuel Use Will Continue to Increase Food Prices, Drive People into Poverty: United Nations
by Matthew McDermott, Brooklyn, NY on 10. 7.08
photo: Kevin Lim
Oxfam said biofuels were pushing millions of people into poverty; a World Bank report said increase in biofuel use was the one of the prime causes of increasing food prices. Adding more weight to the anti-biofuel side of the food versus fuel balance is a new report for the UN Food and Agriculture Organization. In comparing decreasing oil usage or increasing food prices, biofuels will have a greater effect on the latter:
The report finds that while biofuels will offset only a modest share of fossil energy use over the next decade they will have much bigger impacts on agriculture and food security.
Food Price Increases To Continue With Biofuels
The report went on to predict increases in agricultural commodity prices over the next 10 years: If demand for biofuel feedstock rose 30% from 2007 levels, sugar prices would increase by 265, corn prices by 11% and vegetable oil by 6%. (Reuters)
Land Use Changes Can Increase CO2 Emissions
The report also highlighted a topic which is probably familiar to many TreeHugger readers: The fact that when land is put under cultivation for biofuels, when that land was previously wild, often times it absorbs less CO2 than does the cultivated land, thus casting doubt on the carbon-neutral promise of some biofuels:
In many cases, increased emissions from land-use changes are likely to offset or even exceed the greenhouse gas savings obtained by replacing fossil fuels with biofuels; and impacts on water, soil and biodiversity are also a concern.
Second Generation Biofuels Needed
While this report really just points out many of the arguments that have been used increasingly over the past year to point out that first generation biofuels are far from the panacea that they were once believed to be (or at least sometimes presented to be), I think it’s important in that it is one more example of why second generation biofuel research and development is strongly needed. While still not an energy panacea, liquid fuels derived from waste products or grown in situations which truly can never compete with cropland, such as algae-derived fuels, still offer promise as part of a diversified clean energy portfolio.
via :: Reuters
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High school biology: fermentation turns sugars into alcohol and CO2 (note the fat, cellulose, minerals, etc in the food are still there – yeast can’t eat that stuff).
Fact: 90% of corn is feed to cattle.
Fact: Cattle are ruminants = they can process cellulose into protein, they are not designed to consume sugars (corn). Cattle actually gain more weight from the mash than they do from the raw corn.
So, 90% of the US produced corn could be made into ethanol and we would still have the cattle feed.
Lots of propaganda out there about food for fuel. Go back to high school biology to debunk them….and let’s start selling American made fuel.
Fact: $700 billion a year of money earned in the US is spent on buying foreign oil.
This is completely irrelevant, but was that picture taken at a Wegmans Food Market?
actually, not so much.
the food commodity price explosion this year was mostly caused by speculators looking to make money while the stock market has been crashing.
unfortunately for these speculators (but fortunately for anyone who eats food), grain commodity prices are now crashing. so far, they are back to about where they were this time last year, about 50% off their peak prices - and they are continuing to fall.
yea, so long as I see overweight people in this world, I have no bad feelings towards corn ethanol. If we were truly hungry and worried about the worlds poor we would quit throwing away so much food(as i have seen here in america), or even at the worst case scenario we would grow "true" food crops, not corn, for feed to animals.....