That's not the point, and I suspect you know it. The point is more and more land that would otherwise be used to grow food for humans or livestock, is being used to produce corn intended to be used as fuel (and therefore not for human consumption.)
Using land to grow corn to be used for fuel shrinks the available supply for humans and livestock, therefore driving up prices. Combined with the drought in some parts of the country and excessive rain in other parts, the combination of the three is causing prices to skyrocket.
Any reasonable thinking person knows that growing corn to be used as fuel is a bad idea from an economics and energy perspective. It takes more energy to produce ethanol than it returns. That's just the law of thermodynamics in play. The economics of ethanol from a fuel price/food price perspective isn't pretty either. It's a losing proposition any way one looks at it. The only beneficiaries are the ethanol producers who suck at the government teat for our tax dollars.
What should be done with the mountains of surplus grain?
Much of the land on which corn is grown isn’t really suitable for other crops. Corn is a relatively short season crop compared to a lot of them.
What would you want them to grow on those acres?
Another thing, growing produce is prohibitively expensive, and labor intensive and riskier than heck, especially those crops that require hand labor.
Unlike corn, cotton, other grains, there is a small window between harvest and consumption. Even if you are going to a canner, it is risky and you have 1000’s of dollars invested.
The fresh produce market is the most crooked market in this country and now most of it is dominated by Walmart. They pay but they regularly overbuy to guarantee availability and then they reject loads for the lamest excuse, like there was a fly in the truck.
But that is totally wrong. First off corn has been planted for decades and acreage hasn’t expanded that dramatically in the last 20 years. Corn can’t even be planted every year, it has to be rotated with something else. Even then there was surplus. That was a big part of why ethanol was introduced, because there was so many surplus years farmers were losing their shirts.
#2 Yellow dent corn isn’t used for food. The closest you get to that is fructose for soft drinks and food starch a stabilizer. A good majority is used for livestock. Thing is, the DDGS can be used for animal feed. If you take off the stillage, which is the fat and leftover sugars, you have DDG, which is mostly protein a high value animal feed. Nothing is wasted, unless you count the soda pop industry.
Ethanol does not take more energy to produce than it yields. That was bogus info put out by Dave Pimentel out of Cornell, a fairly radical leftist who lumps everything into his equation even it is pre-existing or dual use. Most studies have show a positive energy balance for ethanol.
China is another huge factor in why corn is going up, as is our Fed printing dollars. I agree that mandates and subsidies should be eliminated, but fermenting corn into useful products is a good idea.