Corn, Ethanol, the Rich and Hunger

The above title is the name of a great article written by Mark Sommer. He writes for and runs the award-winning program, A World of Possibilities. In the article, which I have done my best to translate from the Portuguese I read it in (in the local Bauru, SP newspaper Jornal da Cidade), Sommer starts with this: looking beyond corn-based ethanol, it is necessary to search for energy that overcomes the ethically-abhorrent opposition of gasoline for the rich or food for the famished.

Here is some more from his look into a crucial issue in the upcoming years.

"In recent years, huge agribusinesses like Cargill and Archer Daniels Midland have pressured the White house and Congress in order to obtain huge subsidies destined for the production of corn, which has led to the imposition of import tariffs of 54 cents to the gallon. Corn ethanol is bad business all around. As an antidote to climate change, its contribution is insignificant, in that it emits just 13% less greenhouse gases than gasoline. Its rising costs are already evident for the 800 million people who do not have enough to eat.

The pressure applied due to the demand for corn ethanol caused, last year, an increase of 50% in the price of tortilla, the food staple of Mexico. China and India have started to face inflation provoked by the increasing price of corn as well as soy. The world food reserves have begun to fall to levels in which they would not be able to confront a great famine such as those caused by the droughts, floods and other climate disturbances occurring with ever-more-increasing frequency."

According to Sommer, the key to minimizing the economic and environmental impact of ethanol consists in using research and planning to first, make cellulose-based ethanol a reality, by reducing its price and investing in mass-production capabilities, and second, by only using land unfit for food crops, to grow corn or sugar-cane for ethanol. This way, the potential for disaster can be greatly reduced. As he says, the high prices for food do not help the farmer or the consumer. The only ones helped by rising prices are the middlemen...the Cargills of the world.