Grain used to feed more cars than people

Food Into Fuel

In the US last year enough grain to feed 330 million people for one year, at average world consumption levels, was instead turned into ethanol to fuel cars, according to new data from the US Department of Agriculture.

This figure accounts for 25 percent of the total US grain crop and with 200 ethanol distilleries in the country set up to transform food into fuel, the amount of grain processed has tripled since 2004.

The new data has led to accusations that the biofuel revolution that began under the Bush administration in 2007 is starting to damage world food supplies. Under President Bush, ethanol production was increased through farm subsidies and laws as he challenged farmers to increase production by 500 percent by 2017 to cut oil imports and reduce carbon emissions.

But in a globalized food economy, increased demand for food to fuel American vehicles puts additional pressure on world food supplies.

America looms large

Whereas the development of biofuels is important as we try and move away from traditional energy sources, America looms so large in the world food economy that the fact it comes at the expense of food production makes it relatively dangerous. The US is far and away the world's leading grain exporter, exporting more than Argentina, Australia, Canada, and Russia combined.

One of the most worrying findings is that because the wheels of this revolution are so ferociously in motion, it is almost impossible to wind down biofuel production. Since 2007, 80 new ethanol plants have been built with more expected by 2015, by which time the US will need to produce a further 5 billion gallons of ethanol if it is to meet its renewable fuel standard.

Also, even if the entire US grain crop were converted to ethanol (leaving no domestic crop to make bread, rice, pasta, or feed the animals from which we get meat, milk, and eggs), it would satisfy at the very most 18 percent of US automotive fuel needs, as reported by Environmental-Expert.com.

World grain prices at record highs

According to Lester Brown, the director of the Earth Policy Institute, a Washington think tank that conducted the analysis, the growing demand for corn for ethanol helped to push world grain prices to record highs between late 2006 and 2008, people in low-income grain-importing countries were hit the hardest.

This unprecedented spike in food prices drove up the number of hungry people in the world to over 1 billion for the first time in 2009.

"Continuing to divert more food to fuel, as is now mandated by the US federal government in its renewable fuel standard, will likely only reinforce the disturbing rise in world hunger. By subsidising the production of ethanol to the tune of some $6 billion each year, US taxpayers are in effect subsidising rising food bills at home and around the world," said Brown.

Choosing between food and fuel

Even thought the global recession helped to drive food prices back down, they still remain well above their long-term average levels.

Ethanol producers deny that their record production means less food, arguing that innovations and development in technology mean they no longer have to a "false choice between food and fuel", so says Tom Buis, the chief executive of industry group Growth Energy.

The US taxpayer is still funding the subsidization of ethanol production to the tune of $6 billion every year, so the transformation of food to fuel under the federal government's Renewable Fuel Standard will continuing to increase. But at a time when pressures on the earth's land, water and food resources is at record levels we may have to realign our priorities in order to avoid putting large numbers of people at risk and to also avoid potential sources of conflict.

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