Everything you need to know about environmentalism in one sentence
Written by Brian on May 5, 2008 – 12:40 pm - Welcome, if you're new here, you may want to subscribe to our RSS feed or subscribe to our email newsletter. Thanks for visiting!
From The Heritage Foundation’s front page:
The very food-related problems that we see today are much like the hypothesized future ones that were supposed to be caused by global warming.
For the ill-informed, from Heritage:
Last 5 posts by BrianAmerica’s first mandatory policy to reduce global warming emissions is its biofuels mandate. Along with the national security and other perceived benefits, these agriculturally-based alternative fuels were purported to have lower global warming emissions than the petroleum-derived gasoline or diesel fuel they displace. At the beginning of the decade, Al Gore said that “by tripling U.S. use of bioenergy and bioproducts by 2010, we can keep millions of tons of greenhouse gases out of the air….”[5]
Thanks to the 2007 energy bill signed into law by President Bush last December, it is occurring even faster than Gore imagined. The U.S. is now required to mix 9 billion gallons of such fuels into the gasoline supply in 2008, up from less than 3 billion gallons in 2000. The mandate is mostly met by corn-based ethanol. Europe has also set similar targets for biofuels, mostly bio-diesel made from palm oil, rapeseed, or soybeans.
Not surprisingly, diverting crops from food to fuel use has raised food prices. At a little over $2 per bushel when the mandate was first effective, the price of corn has recently surged well above $5, due in large part to nearly a quarter of the crop’s now being needed for fuel use. A host of corn-related foods, such as corn-fed meat and dairy, have seen sharp price increases. Wheat and soybeans are also up, partly as a result of fewer acres now being planted in favor of corn. European biodiesel mandates have had a similar impact.
A Purdue University study places the annual food cost increases for 2007 at $22 billion and estimates that “$15 billion of this increase is related to the recent surge in demand to use crops as fuel.”[6] That $15 billion calculates to an additional $130 per household in 2007, and food prices are considerably higher thus far in 2008.
Other factors–high energy costs, below-average yields in some regions, growing world population, a weak dollar–have also impinged on food supplies and prices. However, most experts see the biofuels mandates as a substantial contributor, and one that exacerbates any other pressures on food costs.
With 800 million people at risk for hunger and malnutrition, the consequences are far more severe in developing nations than they are in developed nations. “When millions of people are going hungry, it’s a crime against humanity that food should be diverted to biofuels,” said Palaniappan Chidambaram, India’s finance minister.[7] World Bank President Robert Zoellick has acknowledged that “biofuels is no doubt a significant contributor” to high food costs, adding that “it is clearly the case that programs in Europe and the United States that have increased biofuel production have contributed to the added demand for food.”[8]
Even some of the political unrest described in the Pentagon study is starting to emerge. Rising prices have led to food-related rioting in several developing nations.[9] While it is not possible to demonstrate conclusively that, this rioting would not have occurred if not for the biofuels mandates, it is far from speculative to assume that the increased pressures of the mandates on food prices were contributors. In any event, the rioters are clearly not responding to global warming, as there has been no additional warming in 2007 and thus far in 2008.
Moreover, all of this is occurring from biofuels usage that is only a fraction of what will be required in the years ahead. America is only one-quarter of the way toward the 36 billion gallon requirement by 2022 included in last December’s big energy bill. The European Union also has plans to increase its biodiesel use, though it is now reconsidering this policy.
To add insult to injury, the global warming benefits of biofuels have been called into question. Two recent studies published in the journal Science conclude that, rather than reducing carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions, biofuels actually increase them.[10] One study finds that clearing lands for energy crops creates a so-called carbon debt by “releasing 17 to 420 times more carbon dioxide than the annual greenhouse gas (GHG) reductions that these biofuels would provide by displacing fossil fuels,”[11] while the other projects “GHG emissions from corn ethanol nearly double those from gasoline for each km driven.”[12]
Last year, a study conducted for the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, presciently entitled “Biofuels: Is The Cure Worse Than the Disease?” stated that “the rush to energy crops threatens to cause food shortages and damage to biodiversity with limited benefits.”[13] The authors were right. Oxfam, an international aid organization that has been very vocal about the threat of global warming, now concedes that “large-scale growth in biofuels demand has pushed up food prices and so far there is little evidence that it is reducing overall carbon emissions.”[14]
- "It's All In The Database" - May 14th, 2008
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- Even the JS agrees on ethanol? - May 11th, 2008
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Posted in Beyond the Facade |
May 5th, 2008 at 3:29 pm
Wait–I’m not sure I understand. We are to take the fact that we currently are experiencing “food-related problems” as evidence that global warming will not create food supply and access problems in the future? If so, that’s embarrassingly poor argumentation.
So poor, in fact, that I must not get it… help me out here.
May 5th, 2008 at 9:47 pm
You’re right, you’re too think-headed to get it.
Environmentalists bitched and moaned to the ends of the earth that we needed to start using our food as fuel. This raised the price of food and diverted entire sectors of the food industry toward the industry now mandated by law, energy. Big Farming has happily gotten on board to milk each one of us.
As food is diverted to energy instead of, er, food, shortages appear and the price of available food for FOOD purposes skyrockets. Again, scarcity promotes higher prices. Thus, it’s a little hard for those in the 3rd world, the people that the Left don’t mind dying if it means we all can be forced to drive Priuses, to buy food now that it’s going toward it’s highest allocated use under government mandates.
And all this is what the Left and the Democrat Party minions predicted would happen with global warming. Only it’s happening because of their hackneyed reaction to their phantom nightmares instead of any real, present threat. Nice job, Dems.
May 6th, 2008 at 8:38 am
Ah, okay. Still shoddy argumentation.
Contributing to the rising price of food is the growing demand from China and India for meat, which not only pushes prices of meat, but also grain (since that’s what animals raised for human consumption eat–cereal). Then there’s also the poor weather conditions this year in food producing countries like Australia and Canada. And then still there’s speculation–as other stocks fall, investors ran to commodities, pushing prices up.
So, given all these factors, I’m to believe that rising food prices are due solely to an American law diverting a fraction of one crop in one country to fuel?
Also, poor people in many developing countries don’t really eat meat very much nor corn–more likely rice.
And finally, that food costs are growing now doesn’t mean that they won’t again later as climates change to be less ag-friendly.
May 6th, 2008 at 9:40 am
The growing demand from China and India for meat? Is that the latest Democrat talking point? Surely you can do better. China, an almost totally agricultural economy, needs foreign meat and India’s Hindu population is in need of meat? Do you know anything about Hinduism?
Unfortunately, American laws aren’t the only ones diverting vast portions of the food economy toward energy, as you assume. All throughout OECD countries national and even supra-national laws now mandate percentages of fuel as biofuels. It’s an international phenomena, which is why you’re seeing an international crisis.
I know environmentalists have a particular obsession with the weather, so you may not realize that different weather patterns happen year after year. Producers learn to react to weather over time, which is why most food supplies on the macro level are fairly insulated from weather conditions.
What is your point about India and China demanding meat if you then say that apparently other “developing” countries don’t demand meat? So is this ever fluctuating demand for meat affecting biofuels or not?
As far as rice, yes, I’m glad you brought it up. If Big Farming wasn’t so wholly entrenched in Congressional subsidies we could do a lot better as far as ethanol is concerned because ethanol from sugar (see also, Brazil) and rice are much more efficient. But, real fuel efficiency be damned, we have Congressional PACs that must be suckled.
But put aside fuel efficiency for a moment, and I’m glad you’ve mentioned rice because the demand for rice for use in fuel is changing food prices in underdeveloped and developing countries much the same way corn is. Just look at the stories about even Wal-mart having to limit the amount of rice available in its stores. Sad.
May 6th, 2008 at 10:15 am
I know it’s a long shot…if the government would stop with the farm subsidies and allow farmers to use all of their land we would have enough corn,wheat,etc. Like I said though, it’s a long shot. I don’t think farmers are going to want to give up the money they get for not farming…
May 6th, 2008 at 10:47 am
Oh, my bad. I took the chief USDA economist Dr. Joseph Glauber at face value when he spoke about global demand and poor weather as contributing factors at the Joint Economic Committee hearing. Read his testimony here.
Then there’s the testimony from the president of National Farmers Union that says oil costs are the major cause of increasing food costs, and cites a Merrill Lynch analyst who estimates the biofuel industry is currently reducing gasoline prices by .15 per gallon.
Clearly the good people at the Heritage Foundation know more about the food economy than a USDA chief economist and know more about contributing factors to food costs than a farmer.
Also, Hidus don’t eat cows, but they sure do eat other meat. Again, obviously you know more about Hinduism than my Hindu Eastern philosophy teacher. My bad.
May 6th, 2008 at 11:21 am
Jessica is right.
A bit part of the problem is that we inflate food prices already by subsidizing farmers and telling them not to … farm.
The effect of insulating Western farm markets from the developing countries, thanks to Big Farming, has been to stunt growth of agriculture in underdeveloped countries.
The natural industrial progression first starts with a healthy agriculture program. That’s hard to come by if no one demands your food because Western import tariffs are sky-high.
May 6th, 2008 at 11:37 am
With all due respect to Brian, you are over-simplifying the effect of ethanol subsidies. While it is certainly the case that our government’s policies are causing harm in the developing world expecially, it is not the whole problem.
Increased demand around the world for basic food stuffs also plays a role and must be addressed as local concerns, not only as an American production and allocation problem. In many instances fields in Africa are being plowed over for the planting of trees, not because the local population needs trees, but rather because that is where “carbon offsets” are placing them. It is another dirty little secret of the environmental movement that few like to talk about. Even so, while this illustrates the utter hypocracy of some on the environmental left, it still does not account for the current crisis in many parts of the world.
The solution here is a combination of ending ethanol subsidies and providing technology and equipment to produce crops in poor and desolate areas of the third world. It will take more than simply throwing bombs and insults, it will take a calm and reasoned approach that includes the US once again being charitable to the rest of the world.
May 6th, 2008 at 3:38 pm
Jeez. Both of you are right. Subsidized farming for ethanol production, the growing demand from China and India for grain and meat, and the bad weather experienced in Australia are all contrributing to the current food crisis. There are many reasons for most things is this issue is no different.
May 6th, 2008 at 3:59 pm
I agree, Richard. Ethanol is a contributing factor, but very far from the whole story. I was trying to point out how myopic Brian was being in pointing to ethanol. He’s wedded to his conclusion, though, so I doubt even the testimony of USDA economists will do much to sway him.
May 6th, 2008 at 4:04 pm
Brian: click the links. Please.
Do you know about the Joint Economic Committee hearing last week?
May 6th, 2008 at 4:07 pm
Sorry Jane, busy day studying for finals, just saw it.
Do you have any evidence from people who don’t have a financial interest in Big Farming? I mean seriously, the USDA and the Farmers Union?
By the way, your Hindu Eastern Philosophy teacher should meet up with my Hindu friends, something’s gone awry with them because they’re not eating any non-bird meat whatsoever.
May 7th, 2008 at 9:01 am
Read the testimony again. It isn’t mere conjecture, but backed up with statistics from independent sources.
It’s hard to say that the Farmers Union is big farming, since they represent family farms. True those family farms might have contracts with Land O’ Lakes and Dole, but to claim they’re big farming is a stretch. I know the word “union” makes your Reagan-loving blood freeze, but it’s a grassroots, family-driven organization.
I was just about to write about USDA stats, but if you’re skeptical about the consumption/production/export/etc. information presented in the testimony, then, well, there’s nothing to say. I suppose you’re also skeptical about the objectivity of US Census population counts.
For more about Indian food consumption, I suggest this article. Though it’s from the Economic Research Service of the USDA, so, you know, it might be all deliberately misleading nonsense designed to strengthen big farming.
Nowhere in the Hindu sacred texts is the eating of meat prohibited. The “no-harm” principle in Hinduism and Buddhism (and Buddhists and Muslims also live in India–it isn’t just Hindus) lends to some people choosing vegetarian diets. As for not eating cows, cows are their pets, so to eat a cow to an Indian would be like us eating dog. Both are perfectly safe for human consumption, but our emotional and cultural ties to the animal make our stomachs turn at the thought of eating them.
Goodness–I can’t believe we’re even having this conversation. Are you so wedded the idea that ethanol is the evil in the current food price spike that you can’t admit to other significant contributing factors?
May 7th, 2008 at 10:57 am
Jane,
My company is a privately held Market Research Company that has provided research data to HUD and other Governmental agencies for the past 20 years on behalf of their request. We often get requests for data at the local level because our collection methods have proven to be more accurate. I can attest to the fact firsthand that the Census Bureau’s data is not very accurate. In our research based on actual field data collected, we have found their data to show an error rate of 15-23% depending on the market region selected. I have found a similar rate of error in most Government Statistics reported. A quick check of any Government data often shows revisions of greater than 25% after a period of 3 months. Bottom line, our Government is not very good at realistic Market Research because of the methodology of collection and the accuracy of information submitted. They are rarely checked for accuracy and are always taken at face value.
Chris
May 7th, 2008 at 12:44 pm
Point taken, Chris. Surveys always have a margin of error. What’s the error rate for studies conducted by your firm? Do you ever revise your findings? You say you have found similar error reports for most “Government Statistics.” Which ones? (Btw, are you German? What’s with capitalizing nouns willy-nilly?) Have you conducted research about the increased food consumption in Indian markets due to rising incomes?
This is a straw-man anyway. My point was about objectivity.
May 7th, 2008 at 5:04 pm
The problem is a falling dollar. When the currency drops, commodities become expensive. While oil and food are the most apparent, prices have gone sky high in most other traded products as well: copper, tin, gold, coffee, coco, lumber.
Thus, we can hardly blame all of the increase on ethanol subsidies. Look for the causes of a sinking dollar. Perhaps the increased debt loads caused by the financing of the Iraq war?
May 11th, 2008 at 8:54 am
Jane,
I’m extremely amused by your shifting comments on India. India’s defense minister might include you as one perpetrating a “cruel joke” along with President Bush for insisting that changing facts of class are affecting food demand. You could also respond to India’s finance minister who above classifies your green ideology as a “crime against humanity.” I’d probably just prefer that you not tell Indians what they are or are not already eating based on religious texts. Or maybe I can just give you a few phone numbers of friends to contact for theological clarification?
As to your comment “I can’t believe we’re even having this conversation” along with Al Gore’s “The debate is over” … well, all I can say is you’re living in a democracy, live with it.
May 11th, 2008 at 8:58 am
Super Id,
The problem with global riots for food are the effects of a poor dollar on U.S. domestic markets?
May 11th, 2008 at 1:44 pm
Brian,
“The problem with global riots for food are the effects of a poor dollar on U.S. domestic markets?”
That’s not the conclusion that I reach. My conclusion is that high commodity prices are directly correlated with a weak dollar, which, if I may add is OPEC’s official position, as well as many Commodity bulls:
http://www.sovereignsociety.com/offshore1920.html
But in response to the query you posit: global riots for food are caused by many factors, including inefficient distribution systems, corruption, and high prices. Each riot would need to be examined on its own facts to reach a appropriate conclusion for determing the riots cause.
May 11th, 2008 at 1:57 pm
This is a post about the cause of global food riots. You’ve said that “the problem is the falling dollar” but now state that it’s “not the conclusion” you reach. Which is it? As far as higher prices in other products, what is the correlation and, even, what is the nature of causation between the two? Gold has been going up for many years now — all of a sudden it’s related to higher food costs?
I’d prefer in citing the OECD that you not simply appeal to authority and leave it at that. I can’t find what you’re referring to on Google though I didn’t search long. I’m not sure if you’re aware but the dollar has been weak for a number of years now. So why does it only now interact with food prices to cause food riots? Even if your premise is correct you have to admit for a series of other causes given the years of decline of the dollar.
May 11th, 2008 at 3:20 pm
You have misinterpreted my point.
My point was simply that ethanol subsidies contribute less to rising corn prices than the falling dollar the cause of rising corn prices.
So I’m not sure how you take my comments to refer to food riots but let’s have some fun.
Yes, we’ve had a weak dollar for a number of years but we’ve had a plunging dollar in the last six months.
http://stockcharts.com/charts/gallery.html?USD
OPEC’s disdain for the dollar is widely reported and I’m surpised your search has come up empty. In fact, today’s drudgereport has several links about the declining dollar and Riyahd’s ability to control the Dollar’s futuree:
http://www.drudgereport.com/
Oil’s up over 25% this year and it will get worse if OPEC makes the Euro the key currency as some members have suggested:
http://moneynews.com/money/archives/st/2007/11/18/211437.cfm
“So why does it only now interact with food prices to cause food riots?”
“Only now?” Come on, surely your not that naive. There have been food riots across the globe since the 70’s. If you will recall, the U.S had a little excursion into Somalia about a decade ago.
Has rioting increased? Sure, so have food prices. As the Dollar Cost Index chart points shows, selling of the Dollar has accelerated. The Dollar’s sell off has ensured massive gains in virtually every commodity. For example, over the same period, Gold ran from 650 to over $1000; Corn from 250 to 650; Cotton 50 to around 85; Coca form 1600 to 2800. And the Euro 125 to 160. For point of reference, a single Euro future’s contract (6.25 a pip) would have gained $21,875 (not a bad return for being a dollar bear).
Finally, of course I admit that there are other causes for a riot other than a falling dollar–Maybe there was tear gas, maybe Mohammed told them to do it, maybe they thought the food fairy would leave them some lucky charms.
Point is, I was not there, and I do not pre-suppose that I know the causes of each riot. However, I would make the same retort to the individuals who are arguing that ethanol subsidies are the cause.
Cheers,
May 11th, 2008 at 3:23 pm
This is the correct Dollar cost index chart. The previous one was for semiconductors
http://stockcharts.com/h-sc/ui?c=USD,uuh,awaclyyaypb40!f][vc60][iue6,12,9!lj[$spx]]
May 12th, 2008 at 12:20 pm
Brian,
I find your inability to engage in substantive and reasoned argumentation rather amusing. Is it Marquette that taught you to engage in dialog by dismissing anyone who disagrees with you as peddling ideologically-motivated sludge? If so, demand your money back, son!
May 12th, 2008 at 3:52 pm
Jane, you display a wonderful ability to hide ad-hominem as an argument. Find time to make an argument or respond to my posts or go elsewhere.
May 13th, 2008 at 8:17 am
If I could find an argument from you, I’d respond.