Posted on 07/26/2007 8:47:56 AM PDT by Uncledave
Any author who cites food shortages in the turd world because we are converting grain to ethanol is probably also against big oil.
The author’s mention of Bush and Cheny and Haliburton and Monsanto as somehow conspiring to not only raise energy prices but food prices is a socialists way of saying that sharecroppers should be sharing their food rather than hoarding it for profit. American grain production has nothing to do with the capabilities of India or commie China feeding their masses. We are not obligated to feed those people although the globalist United Nothing view is that we should feed the world for free because we are a rich nation.
And any study from Berkley has to be suspect.
This whole article is a crock. We produce grain and we do whatever we want with it. The rest of the world will have to get over the fact that is is not our obligation to feed every starving pissant, regardless of what they think.
It is a lot more fun running around yelling “We are all gonna die!!!” though. :)
All the while China will be burning oil from the Gulf of Mexico.
Living in Wisconsin farm country, I see food pricing going up and farmers point to the Biofuel fad as the reason. A case point is the link below... I don’t post often so please forgive the format errors :) - Please put me on your ping list!
Burning food AND our tax dollars to help subsidize it!
Ethanol is a SCAM SCAM SCAM!
Wish they would stop putting corn syrup in soda beverages.
Seems like an excuse to raise prices.
If they raise cereal prices much I think you are right. However meat, eggs, milk are much more dependent on the cost of feed. So we could see some quite dramatic increases on those foods.
Our leaders are the best money can buy. I'm going to be interested to see when many farms in the third world switch over to ethanol.. how many millions of people in the third world end up starving to death. For you and me if the price of meat doubles its an inconvenience and we can use less or cut back on other areas of life. For a person just making it, they have to make due on maybe 40% less calories a day.
Well it will be another go in a long line of leftwing ideas that end up costing millions of lives. For example DDT, or the Chinese great leap forward.
Look for Boylan Sugar Cane Cola - great taste, real sugar. ;)
So the farmer has to spend more to feed his livestock. He then can go and say “I am not going to sell you these eggs or this milk unless I get more money” and the buyer will fork over the money just because the farmer is paying more for feed?
Supply and Demand, not cost of production determines prices. Farmers may choose to not to raise chickens or cows if the costs get too great. Usually that depresses the price of beef or chicken in the short term as the farmers sell off their herds at a loss to avoid the costs of feeding them. Then after a while when the supply does not meet demand the prices goes up until it becomes profitable for more production until soon there is overproduction of the product and the price goes down.
Now, I’m not trying to argue, just to understand, but how would you respond to those who say that since many farmers are switching to growing corn, there are fewer farmers growing other things—so by the law of supply and demand, those other things will be more scarce and cost more?
Thanks for helping me understand this debate.
People in the turd world were starving long before ethanol production started taking hold.
Ethanol does not take all the food, not even close to taking all the food. Most items with processed corn contain such small amounts of corn that a few cents a bushel difference in the price of the raw material compared to the finished product should not equate into the kind of increases we are seeing.
A by-product of ethanol is a high protein corn mash that is being fed to livestock as a feed suppliment. Again, a few pennies a bushel more for the processed feed grain should not substantially increase the cost of meat and poultry and eggs.
Another myth is that farm prices are set by farmers. That is not true. Farm prices are set by commodity traders at the Chicago Board of Trade. These traders speculate on supply and demand of particular items (oil included) and then set bid price on a commodity for the day. And prices can change from day to day because of outside factors like weather, trade deals, and government mandated crop reports that signal planting intentions for a growing season. There are also mandated livestock reports that are fed into the speculation factor. I suspect that most of the markup we see in farm commodity pricing comes well beyond the farm, and more in the pockets of middle men who use leverage of supply to justify pricing.
And finally. The cost of transportation. since fuel prices are up the cost of transporting and delivering grocerys has gone up accordingly. The grocers have to pass this cost on to the consumer.
The bottom line here is.......the price a farmer is paid is the smallest portion of the cost of food. Ethanol is a way for the farmer to realize much more profit from his investment than letting a middle man commodity broker set his price so he can add a markup when he resells.
People won’t starve because of ethanol. They were already starving and will always be starving somewhere, sometime.
This article is filled with BS. What the author is saying is that growing biomass does not capture more of the sun’s energy than that found in oil used to do the planting and processing. It is calculated that about 400 gallons of ethanol/acre of corn planted is captured. I planted 62 acres this year using about 30 gallons of diesel fuel, about 0.5 gallons/acre. Granted, I am not counting the fertilizer, but still, this article is way past rational. The other big point omitted from the article is the feed by-products remaining that is used to feed livestock. With continuing improvements in corn-based ethanol production, we can look at the future where 1000 gallons of ethanol/acre of corn is foreseeable.
Well, corn was $2/bushel in 1950 and was still $2/bu less than 2 years ago. So now it is $4/Bu after almost 60 years. Looking at the population, several people might benefit from a bit less food consumption. WE WILL SURVIVE!
Also, keep in mind that processing corn for ethanol removes only the starch, all other nutrients remain.
Currently it takes 11 Acres of Annual Agricultural land to make enough bio-diesel for one car for one year.
http://www.fapri.missouri.edu/outreach/publications/2006/biofuelconversions.pdf
There are approximately 224,000,000 cars driven annually in the U.S.
Currently US Agriculture is at maximum capacity. Just a 9% switch in existing Acreage has affected a rise in prices. So these would have to be additional acres. Even if we were to get that down to 1 acre per year for production we would need 224,000,000 additional acres.
The entire state of Texas is 167,550,080 Acres. 261,797 sq miles times 640 acres per sq. mile.
“Biofuels” or agriculturally produced fuel, is a niche fuel and an over 100 year old technology that should remain a niche fuel.
My opinion: for as long as possible I would rather get my energy from a 4” hole, than acres of land.
I would rather be dependent on foreign oil, than foreign food.
— lates
— jrawk
I don’t dispute the fapri figures, but you failed to mention the food value remaining after the oil is extracted.
I went back home three weeks ago...to the farming community where I grew up. Same story....dry corn. Numerous folks have put up these pellet heating systems which can burn corn...so they grown corn to heat their house, and to sell to the bio fuels folks, the pellet heating folks, the cattle feed folks and the general food folks. Corn will double in price within three years and everyone will be trying to grow as much corn as possible. All corn-related products will do a huge jump in price shortly.
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