Secret report: Biofuels upped food price

Secret report: Biofuels upped food price

www.theaustralian.news.com.au

BIOFUELS have forced global food prices up by 75 per cent – far more than previously estimated – according to a confidential World Bank report published in a British newspaper today.

The assessment is based on a detailed analysis by Don Mitchell, an internationally respected economist at the global financial body, the Guardian said.

The figure contradicts US Government estimates that plant-derived fuels have contributed less than 3 per cent to food-price increases, the newspaper said.

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Well I guess this is explains the jump in food prices far better. I think it is time to relegate biofuels to the back seat it deserves and focus on better energies.

www.theaustralian.news.com.au
(visit the link for the full news article)

*sigh*

Why are they using corn? It makes no sense.

There is an alternative being tested lately, which is Jerusalem Artichoke.

It's not from Jerusalem and and it's not an artichoke. Just a funky name for a North American native tuber, relative of the sunflower family.

In some areas where it's found growing wild, it's considered a nuisance. It's prolific and perennial. No matter how much you try to get every bit of tuber out, it's bound to return.

www.lib.unb.ca.../&filename=Baker.htm

It can also be a source of fructose.

www.hort.purdue.edu...

www3.interscience.wiley.com...

www.freepatentsonline.com...

It's edible for both humans and animals. It has a texture similar to a potato.

Now, lots of people like to eat corn. It's common in Tex-Mex food, good on the BBQ, or simply boiled on the cob. Cornbread is nice too in the winter to have with a bowl of hot chili.

But not too many people like to eat the Jerusalem Artichoke, because of the potential gut wrenching digestive experience. (Lots of tummy grumblies, gas and such.)

So instead of using a popular food like corn that has to be seeded, fertilized and sprayed every year (in addition to the GMO side of corn) for ethanol production, why not substitute a perennial N American native tuber plant that is happy in poor soil and needs no spraying?

Corn puts out what... 2-3 ears per plant? Jerusalem Artichoke puts out several large tubers per plant.

Leave corn alone and let's just eat the stuff, preferably non-GMO of course.

In the last week China has dredged 170,000 tons of algae out of the South China Sea. I wonder why they aren't using that? Surely they can convert a reasonable enough portion of it to make it viable being biomass after all.

www.theaustralian.news.com.au...

Originally posted by Ceara

Corn puts out what... 2-3 ears per plant? Jerusalem Artichoke puts out several large tubers per plant.

Tell me where I can get some of that corn to plant, mine only makes one ear per stalk.

We can produce a lot of ethanol from corn. We export about as much corn as we use here, plus we could convert most of the land that is used to produce cotton into corn production.

I do agree that corn is not the most efficient crop for ethanol production, there are other crops that have a higher ethanol yield than corn.

Brazil is using sugar cane and having no problem with it. Using foodstuffs for fuel was an idiotic idea and any one who tried to tell the PTB was ridiculed by Greens as backward thinking. So much vegitation can be used to make Biofuel other than corn.
Zindo

is this the sort of fuel that is costing the planet it's trees and it's enviroment for some of our wildlife, if so maybe we should think of something else, i have read that in some places they are planting certain crops that are changing everything in some parts of the world