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Thread: maybe US policymakers are not so dumb after all re corn based ethanol

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    Default maybe US policymakers are not so dumb after all re corn based ethanol

    (snip)"Josette Sheeran, WFP executive director, said in an interview with the Financial Times: “In a world where our contributions are holding fairly steady, this [cost increase] means we are able to reach far less people.”

    She said policymakers were becoming more concerned about the impact of biofuel demand on food prices and how the world would continue to feed its expanding population.

    The warning could re-ignite the debate on food versus fuel amid concerns biofuel production will sustain food inflation and hit the world’s poorest people.

    The WFP said its purchasing costs had risen “almost 50 per cent in the last five years”. The UN organisation said the price it pays for maize had risen up to 120 per cent in the past sixth months in some countries.

    Biofuel demand is soaking up grain production as is rising consumption in emerging countries for animal feed.

    “We face the tightest agriculture markets in decades and, in same cases, on record,” Ms Sheeran said. Global wheat stocks have fallen to the lowest level in 25 years, according to the US Department of Agriculture.

    Ms Sheeran added: “We are no longer in a surplus world.” '(snip)

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    Default Re: maybe US policymakers are not so dumb after all re corn based ethanol

    here is an EXTREMELY interesting chart ... which unfortunately does not show details of the 'changes' that have taken place over the past 18 months since the US enacted ethanol fuel additive laws and subsidies.



    It occurs to me that food production is one of the very FEW things which cannot be easily outsourced to foreign countries. Food production is highly dependent on US dominated Agro company research / products, is highly dependent on the characteristics of local soils and local climate, is also highly dependent on large capital investment in farm equipment/infrastructure, and is extremely dependent on the 'expertise' of farmers to bring all of these factors together to make optimum use of resources given specific local conditions.

    Zimbabwe has proved unconditionally that there is more to efficient food production than 'ownership' of the means of production ...

    (snip)"Agricultural production in Zimbabwe, once known as the breadbasket of Africa, has slumped by more than 50 percent since the government instituted its land reform programme, which also ushered in an era of hyperinflation, now running at 1,281 percent a year - the highest in the world - and acute shortages of foreign currency, fuel, food, water, electricity and medical supplies, with unemployment touching 80 percent.

    Before 2000, Zimbabwe had about 4,500 white commercial farmers, now there are fewer than 600. In late 2006 the government said it would return land to white farmers who were still interested in farming and issue them with 99-year leases. So far, 16 white farmers have reportedly received leases, along with hundreds more black farmers.

    Edward Mkhosi, shadow minister for agriculture in the opposition party, Movement for Democratic Change, warned that the ongoing evictions of white farmers from their land could cause food shortages to persist, as black farmers were battling to produce anything on the farms allocated to them, as a result of the government's failure to supply new farmers with agricultural inputs.

    "It is public knowledge that our own black farmers lack the capacity to produce anything, be it tobacco or maize. They are ill-equipped, they have no inputs or adequate knowledge to go about farming and this is having far-reaching consequences in the agricultural sector," Mkhosi said.

    "Surely it would be detrimental if government was to go by what Mutasa is saying. Already we are grappling with food shortages due to lack of production in the farming sector, and it is a problem wrought by government through its land reforms. If we are serious, as a nation, about empowering our people with the land that we are distributing, we have to empower them with inputs as well, so that they can produce enough food, or we will starve as a nation," Mkhosi said.

    Agriculture Minister Joseph Made was unavailable for comment.

    Faced with drought, disruptions in the farming sector and an economy in freefall, Zimbabwe, once a net exporter of food, is battling to produce enough to feed itself, and instead relies heavily on donor support and food imports from other countries. Humanitarian aid agencies have warned that 1.4 million people will need urgent food aid this year."(snip) from


    Is it possible that the US corn ethanol program was a deliberate attempt to cause huge problems of hunger plus economic upheaval due to high food prices, and thus political unrest, throughout most of the world, which would quickly shift the worldwide power base away from the oil producers and towards the food producers instead ? Also, this would quickly shift the worldwide reserve currency moves away from the control of oil producing countries and back towards the world's leading food producer instead ? After all, people can't eat crude oil, and can't grow crops in deserts. If so, Machiavelli would be proud !!!
    Last edited by Melonie; 07-15-2007 at 07:01 PM.

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