Editorials

Higher food prices are a burden for many Americans, but for others in the world, they’re a matter of life and death. And public policies that drive those prices even higher are worse than irresponsible, says David Ridenour of the National Center for Public Policy Research.

“The red-hot Congressional love affair with the alternative fuel ethanol is starting to leave many supermarket customers feeling mighty blue these days as they pay inflated prices for grocery staples,” Ridenour says. “Even worse, it’s likely to dramatically increase the cases of chronic hunger, malnutrition and starvation in the poverty-stricken nations of Africa and Southeast Asia in the months ahead.”

It could get even worse.

“With the prices of some food staples soaring upward of 40 percent as more farmers plant corn for ethanol rather than human food and animal feed, many environmental groups are raising the specter of global food shortages of apocalyptic proportions,” he says. “The increased amount of acreage devoted to growing corn for ethanol means the United States will ultimately export less grain — further harming poor nations that rely heavily on food imports for their basic sustenance.”

Some experts predict that the 800 million human beings currently living in hunger will rise to 1.2 billion by 2025.

“The subsidies and tariffs have triggered a rush to invest in America’s new biofuel industry,” says Ridenour. “Dozens of new ethanol plants are popping up across the agricultural states of the Midwest like mushrooms after a spring rain. A region that once produced much of Americans’ food and sent its surpluses to feed the world’s hungry now is producing grain for automotive fuel — the beneficiary of earmarks from the Capitol Hill friends of prairie farmers.”

Ethanol isn’t just overproduced — it’s overrated.

“Ironically, ethanol delivers an energy punch about 30 percent lower than standard gasoline, so motorists will find their overall gas mileage plummeting even as they shell out more money,” Ridenour says. “That doesn’t trouble Midwestern corn farmers, many of whom have doubled their incomes as the government-induced demand for ethanol has sent corn prices rocketing upward over the past few years.”

Yet Congress continues to cling to ethanol as a “green” fuel that will help slow global warming by producing less carbon dioxide.

“Well, maybe not,” Ridenour points out. “Ethanol is so corrosive that it cannot be transported by pipelines and must be hauled overland in tanker-trucks. Since the bulk of the ethanol is produced in the heartland and consumed on both coasts, the carbon dioxide emitted by tanker-trucks leaves a carbon footprint which crisscrosses the United States tens of thousands of times a day.”

Even if Congress hasn’t caught on yet, some of the more zealous environmental groups have, Ridenour reports.

“In late January, representatives of the Rainforest Action Network (RAN), Student Trade Justice Campaign and Food First met in front of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s San Francisco office to demand a moratorium of all federal incentives for ethanol and other biofuels,” he says.”

Michael Brune, RAN’s executive director, disagrees that ethanol is a “fuel of the future.”

“Such fuels, he said, shouldn’t emit more greenhouse gases than gasoline, degrade priceless eco-systems and force poor people off their land,” Ridenour says. “He noted that giant agribusinesses like ADM and Cargill are clearing tropical rain forests in Indonesia and New Guinea to grow biofuels for export to advanced countries.”

Will Congress listen? Ridenour has his doubts. But the arguments against ethanol mandates continue to mount.

()