Posted on 11/03/2007 10:03:00 AM PDT by BGHater
Soaring crop prices and demand for biofuels raise fears of political instability
Empty shelves in Caracas. Food riots in West Bengal and Mexico. Warnings of hunger in Jamaica, Nepal, the Philippines and sub-Saharan Africa. Soaring prices for basic foods are beginning to lead to political instability, with governments being forced to step in to artificially control the cost of bread, maize, rice and dairy products.
Record world prices for most staple foods have led to 18% food price inflation in China, 13% in Indonesia and Pakistan, and 10% or more in Latin America, Russia and India, according to the UN Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO). Wheat has doubled in price, maize is nearly 50% higher than a year ago and rice is 20% more expensive, says the UN. Next week the FAO is expected to say that global food reserves are at their lowest in 25 years and that prices will remain high for years.
Last week the Kremlin forced Russian companies to freeze the price of milk, bread and other foods until January 31, for fear of a public backlash with a parliamentary election looming. "The price of goods has risen sharply and that has hit the poor particularly hard," said Oleg Savelyev, of the Levada Centre polling institute.
India, Yemen, Mexico, Burkina Faso and several other countries have had, or been close to, food riots in the last year, something not seen in decades of low global food commodity prices. Meanwhile, there are shortages of beef, chicken and milk in Venezuela and other countries as governments try to keep a lid on food price inflation.
(Excerpt) Read more at guardian.co.uk ...
All bogus. If some region is starving it is a distribution problem, maybe some Stalin trying to starve them out.
Venezuela and Mexico are run by sclerotic socialists who have caused all of their own problems. Same can be said for most/all of the other examples cited.
Of course al-Guardian will never think to prescribe LESS communism and socialism among virtually all of the countries named, in order to allow market forces to respond to price and demand incentives with more supply. No, the left’s solution is always more central command-and-control and elimination of market incentives, including all the silly and anti-efficient political demands to prop up more production of “bio-fuels”....
Let's make clear that the problems in Venezuela are not due to the production of biofuels but to the communist policies being implemented by Chavez.
AGW™ ping
Payback's a bitch...
Food will soon replace oil as the most desired and costly product to pocess.
Good point.
I’ve driven a turbo diesel car, and those things are @$$-kickin’! If they can solve the emissions problems, and make it so the fuel doesn’t gel in the winter, I’d have to seriously consider one. They’re fast, fun, and efficient. Except of course that the engine’s redline is 4,500 RPM.
Funny you should mention taxes because my thought was to actually REDUCE taxes on gasoline sold at stations that provide an NG pump. Say .05 off the gasoline tax to facilitate building the infrastructure.
This would achieve two goals ... first, a modest tax reduction on gasoline, and second, provide a market advantage (be it short lived) to those gas stations that take the risk and invest in the NG equipment.
If you reduce taxes the right way, it can be part of the solution.
He must have lousy mechanics ... two of the fleet managers (both small commercial operations) that I know rave about how NG is less wear and tear on their engines and require less maintenance.
I may have spoken too soon about the mechanic’s skills. The trucks in the commercial fleet I’m aware of are after market re-fits of 1-ton pickups. I have heard from others that some fleet vehicles are not conversions but are designed to be CNG vehicles and are relatively “new” engines. As such, some of them do not have a good track record when it comes to maintenance as the engine designs have not been proven by the market.
I was planning to purchase a bi-fuel (diesel / cng) pickup for my next vehicle. I will have to look at this again.
Tax control is never a solution. It is always the problem.
Reducing taxes is always the solution.
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