Thanks Loads, Ethanol Pushers

Enjoy eating? Get ready to pay through the nose!

So the price of food continues to soar, thanks in no small part to the ravening maw that is ethanol production. Our enormous energy subsidy to the corn growing belt is having the (possibly) unintended consequence of creating corn shortages, driving the price of consumer goods and especially meat and dairy through the roof.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Almost a third of the U.S. grain crop next year may be diverted from the family dinner table to the family car as fuel, putting upward pressure on food prices, a leading expert warned on Tuesday.

Grain prices are near record levels as the United States produces more ethanol, now made mostly from corn, to blend with gasoline and stretch available motor fuel supplies.

Farmers, hoping to cash in, are expected to grow 30 percent of next year's grain crop for ethanol use as more refineries that process corn into fuel come online, according to Lester Brown, president of the Earth Policy Institute and long-time critic of using food grains for fuel.

Thirty percent. Thirty percent of our corn is being thrown away just so people can drive inefficient flex-fuel SUVs. Speaking of:

Brown said that an SUV with a 25-gallon tank filling up with ethanol would use enough grain, about 560 pounds (254 kg), to feed the average person for one year.

What a rate of return!

Meanwhile, at the supermarket, things only get worse for Americans already feeling the impact of Bush's terrible economic policies:

The falling value of the U.S. dollar is contributing to a rise in food prices, particularly with imported foods such as fruit from Spain. A gallon of whole milk that sold for $2.78 in January 2000 costs around $3.95 today.

Eggs were 97 cents at the dawn of the new millennium. Now they're $2.49 a dozen.

Fresh whole chicken prices jumped from $1.05 to $1.49 a pound in the same time frame.

"A lot of that is attributed to the declining dollar," said P.J. DiNuzzo, president of DiNuzzo Investment Advisors Inc. in Beaver, Pa. "The weaker currency is having an effect all across the board, all the way to food prices."

So he's ruined the dollar, crippled our food supply, and driven the price of basic sustenance into the stratosphere. But this is Bush we're talking about here! Surely he can make a bad situation even worse, perhaps with the help of a compliant Democratic Congress?

Also, the new federal energy bill calling for a sevenfold increase in ethanol production to meet clean air standards and reduce dependence on imported petroleum may be having the unintended consequence of causing shortages of corn - which is used in ethanol production - in turn driving up the prices of a wide array of food products derived from corn.

By 2012, the U.S. goal is to produce 7.5 billion gallons of ethanol a year, meaning U.S. annual corn production must rise 22 percent from about 10.9 billion bushels to 13.5 billion bushels to meet the demand.

Corn prices are at their highest level since the drought of 1995, jumping from around $2.18 per bushel in 2002 to $4.78 per bushel this week.

Ahh, that's more like it. Just one more point to hit and we'll have all the highlights: can we injure our international relations and/or devastate the global poor with this policy? Survey says yes!

Beyond U.S. borders, the sharp rise corn prices recently led Mexicans to demonstrate in the streets of their capital over the skyrocketing price of corn tortilla, a staple of their diet.

Finally, although it's hard to find a good article on this, it's being noted that the rise in food prices and decline in supplies is having an impact on food banks:

Additionally, the demand on farmers to replace food and feed crops with crops for ethanol manufacturing has impacted surplus food supplies and food costs dramatically.

Once again, I tip my hat to greedy ethanol producers and the farm lobby. You've managed to screw the environment, the poor, the American consumer, all in one fell stroke.

Sources: Gleaner's Food Bank

The Toledo Blade

Reuters