By CFDC’s Douglas Durante, Letter to the Editor, Business Week —
Blaming ethanol as the main driver of rising food costs is misinformed and inaccurate (“The Global Grain Bubble,” Jan. 18, 2008). Multiple studies have shown that a number of factors impact the cost of food, most notably labor, fuels, transportation, packaging, and other non-farm costs. Additionally, a study released in December of 2007 by a Memphis-based commodity market research firm shows corn prices have minimal impact on the U.S. Consumer Price Index for food, based on 20 years of price data. Studies by the federal government have come to the same conclusion. With regard to supply, one-third of the grain is maintained in the ethanol process which goes back to into the feeding cycle. Increases in corn yields will allow the US to not only meet fuel needs but increase both exports and reserves.
With respect to what the new US energy bill does, you need to do your homework. While the new do in fact require the use of 36 billion gallons of biofuels over the next 15 years, the majority of that must come from non-food sources including wood chips, switchgrass, and other inexpensive and readily available biomass. In processing these feedstocks, they have to demonstrate a substantial reduction in greenhouse gas emissions. These second-generation biofuels will provide a host of financial, environmental, and energy benefits over the imported and polluting oil that has such a stranglehold over much of the globe.
~ Douglas A. Durante
Executive Director
Clean Fuels Development Coalition