Our latest ZimmPoll asked the question, “What causes higher food prices?” Most people responding seem to believe it’s a combination of factors – 47%. That’s followed by higher gas/energy costs at 23%, speculators at 18%, ethanol at 9% and weather at 3%. I wonder how the response would compare to an audience for a general news website like Fox or …
FAO Urged to See Oil and Food Price Correlation
The Global Renewable Fuels Alliance (GRFA) is calling on delegates to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (UNFAO) meeting in Rome to focus on the price of oil as the real driver behind rising food costs. Last week while addressing the South American renewable fuels industry in Buenos Aires, GRFA spokesperson Bliss Baker presented data showing the direct link …
RFA Analyzes USDA Report for Ethanol
The Renewable Fuels Association (RFA) hosted a webinar this morning to discuss the new USDA Prospective Planting and Grain Stocks reports and what they indicate for America’s supply of corn and how demand from ethanol production might play into food pricing this year. Some of the main points made by RFA VP of Research and Analysis Geoff Cooper about the …
World Bank Report Takes New Look at Food and Fuel
Ethanol production probably had less impact on global commodity prices in 2008 than many were saying at the time. A newly released working paper, entitled “Placing the 2006/08 Commodity Price Boom into Perspective,” from the Development Prospects Group at the World Bank, concludes that “…the effect of biofuels on food prices has not been as large as originally thought.” Authors …
One-Sided Article Blames Ethanol for Meat Price Hike
The ethanol industry was quick to respond to a Bloomberg Business Week article Monday that places the blame for the current hike in meat prices solely on using corn for ethanol. The story quotes several meat industry representatives who state that current higher meat prices are “ethanol-induced” – the result of hog and cattle herds that were reduced in 2008 …
Anti-Ethanol Machine Back in Action
The Grocery Manufacturers Association (GMA) and fellow ethanol foes have been fairly quiet since food prices began moderating last year, but the coalition has gotten back into action this past week with a new campaign opposing E15. A scathing editorial in the Washington Times Monday followed directly on the heels of a full-page ad in “The Hill” last week sponsored …
UK Report on Food Crisis Vindicates Ethanol
A new report commissioned by the UK’s Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) has concluded that drought and high oil prices, not biofuels, were behind the so-called food crisis of 2007/2008. “Available evidence suggests that biofuels had a relatively small contribution to the 2008 spike in agricultural commodity prices,” the report noted. “Studies which have found a large …
ACE Responds to Ethanol Attack Ad
The American Coalition for Ethanol (ACE) is calling claims made by an advertising campaign against ethanol by a coalition food and oil company groups “half-baked.” “If the products sold to consumers by Big Food are as half-baked as their ethanol claims, we have a life-threatening food safety crisis in America,” stated Brian Jennings, Executive Vice President of ACE. “Never before …
Russia Calls for More Regulation In Global Ag Exports
After becoming one of the top three wheat exporters in 2008, Russia is now determined to play a pivotal role in the flow of worldwide agriculture markets. Russian Federation’s President Dmitry Medvedev has proposed closer coordination between global grain exporters and said, “excessive protectionism had encouraged speculation in global grain markets,” during the World Grain Forum which took place over …
Ethanol, Corn Not Culprit in Rising Food Prices
The American Farm Bureau Federation, Growth Energy, National Farmers Union, and National Corn Growers Association joined together today to host a media call to applaud the recently released report from the Congressional Budget Office, “The Impact of Ethanol Use on Food Prices and Greenhouse-Gas Emissions.” The report concluded that from April 2007-April 2008 ethanol did have a slight impact on …