It’s Getting Hot In Here

While the 1990s were marked by “Food for Oil,” The first quarter of the Twenty-First Century will be marked by “Food AS Oil,” and the implications of this for food security and food sovereignty are significant. As the Global North’s desire for ethanol and clean gas increases, the amount of corn destined for food (and feed for animals that become food) decreases. As C. Ford Runge and Benjamin Senauer highlight in this months issue of Foreign Affairs, “filling the 25-gallon tank of an SUV with pure ethanol requires over 450 pounds of corn – which contains enough calories to feed one person for a year.” With millions of people starving worldwide, it is worth reflecting a bit on biofuels.

Currently, much of the corn grown in the US and Canada is destine for animal feed. Indeed, there are serious environmental impacts associated with livestock factory farming but increasingly, the people who grow the feed for these animals (for big operations and small alike) are switching to another genetically-modified corn plant for ethanol production. This is already having a significant impact on local food production as farmers are increasingly unable to afford to feed their animals. There are also significant environmental consequences associated with bio-fuel production (monoculture, pesticide and herbicide use and etcetera). If small-scale, sustainanble local farmers (most of whom require second jobs to continue farming) are unable to feed their animals, they will have to a) bump up the cost of their food, or b) go out of business. The result is even less access to locally produced food. Beyond the threat to local food security, there are significant social issues that must be raised with respect to biofuel production.

Runge and Senauer’s article How Biofuels Could Starve the Poor illuminates that:

The push for ethanol and other biofuels has spawned an industry that depends on billions of dollars of taxpayer subsidies, and not only in the United States. In 2005, global ethanol production was 9.66 billion gallons, of which Brazil produced 45.2 percent (from sugar cane) and the United States 44.5 percent (from corn). Global production of biodiesel (most of it in
Europe), made from oilseeds, was almost one billion gallons.

The enormous volume of corn required by the ethanol industry is sending shock waves through the food system. (The United States accounts for some 40 percent of the world’s total corn production and over half of all corn exports.) In March 2007, corn futures rose to over $4.38 a bushel, the highest level in ten years. Wheat and rice prices have also surged to decade highs, because even as those grains are increasingly being used as substitutes for corn, farmers are planting more acres with corn and fewer acres with other crops.>

This might sound like nirvana to corn producers, but it is hardly that for consumers, especially in poor developing countries, who will be hit with a double shock if both food prices and oil prices stay high.

International Implications

Runge and Senauer are quick top point out that “[b]iofuels may have even more devastating effects in the rest of the world, especially on the prices of basic foods. If oil prices remain high — which is likely — the people most vulnerable to the price hikes brought on by the biofuel boom will be those in countries that both suffer food deficits and import petroleum.”

Mexico

Not only is our food supply being challenged by our desire to drive-clean, our demand for ethanol is already having an impact on the price of corn in Mexico, where the corn tortilla is a staple.

On January 13, 2007, the Associate Press released a story elucidating that:

Soaring international demand for corn has caused a spike in prices for Mexico’s humble tortilla, hitting the poor and forcing President Felipe Calderon’s business-friendly government into an uncomfortable confrontation with powerful monopolies. Tortilla prices have jumped nearly 14 percent over the past year, a move the head of Mexico’s central bank called “unjustifiable” in a country where inflation ran about 4 percent.Economists blame increased U.S. production of ethanol from corn as an alternative to oil. The battle over the tortilla, the most basic staple of the Mexican diet, especially among the poor, demonstrates how increasing economic integration is felt on the street level.“ This is direct evidence of the way globalization is affecting all walks of life in Mexico and all over the world,” said David Barkin, an economics professor at the Autonomous Metropolitan University in Mexico City.

Brazil

Runge and Senauer explain that Brazil currently produces comparable amounts of ethanol as the
United States, but that they derive it from sugar cane. “Like the United States,” note the authors, “Brazil began its quest for alternative energy in the mid-1970s. The government has offered incentives, set technical standards, and invested in supporting technologies and market promotion. It has mandated that all diesel contain two percent biodiesel by 2008 and five percent biodiesel by 2013.”

This push for ethanol production is not being well received on the ground. Recently, representatives of organizations and social movements of Brasil, Bolivia, Costa Rica, Colombia, Guatemala, and the Dominican Republic, gathered at a forum on the expansion of the sugarcane industry in Latin America. After the conference, they released a statement outlining their perspective on the sugar cane industry in
South America.

The current model of production of bioenergy is sustained by the same elements that have always caused the oppression of our peoples: appropriation of territory, of natural resources, and the labor force. Historically the sugar industry served as an instrument to maintain colonialism in our countries and the creation of dominant classes that have controlled, through today, large extensions of land, the industrial process, and commercialization. This sector is based on latifundio ownership, on the overexploitation of labor (including slave labor) and the appropriation of public resources. This sector was created upon intensive and extensive monocropping, provoking concentration of land, profit, and wealth.The sugarcane industry was one of the main agricultural activities developed in the colonies. It allowed sectors that controlled production and commercializaction to continue accumulating capital and with this contribute to the development of capitalism in Europe. In Latin America, the creation and control of the State, beginning in the 19th century, continued to service the colonial interests. Currently, control of the State by this sector is characterized by so-called “bureaucratic capitalism”. The sugar industry defined the political structures of national States and of Latin American economies.

To conclude

Runge and Senauer conclude:

The future can be brighter if the right steps are taken now. Limiting U.S. dependence on fossil fuels requires a comprehensive energy-conservation program. Rather than promoting more mandates, tax breaks, and subsidies for biofuels, the U.S. government should make a major commitment to substantially increasing energy efficiency in vehicles, homes, and factories; promoting alternative sources of energy, such as solar and wind power; and investing in research to improve agricultural productivity and raise the efficiency of fuels derived from cellulose.Washington’s fixation on corn-based ethanol has distorted the national agenda and diverted its attention from developing a broad and balanced strategy. In March, the
U.S. Energy Department announced that it would invest up to $385 million in six biorefineries designed to convert cellulose into ethanol. That is a promising step in the right direction.

As for my thoughts on this all, well, I kinda feel like “here we go again.” When it comes to climate change and alternative energy use, it is really, really, really, really, important that we do not jump to quick (read: simple/too good to be true) solutions. There are myriad negative social and environmental impacts associated with bio-fuel production. Let’s not forget how much CO₂ is released from tilling– from the soil itself and from the machines that do the tilling– or the impacts of monoculture agriculture, or, what the rise of another cash crop means for Indigenous Peoples and traditional lands as more and more land is usurped, rid of indigenous plants and replanted with GMO seeds. We must analyse the global impacts of our actions or we will continue to hit up against Western solutions that have devastating implications for others. It also comes back to our culture of consumption. For me, consumption patters form the root of many of the problems that we currently face.

Finally, Michael Pollan’s book, The Omnivore’s Dilemma provides a very thorough review of the politics and consumption of corn in the US (read the introduction and first chapter for free online http://www.michaelpollan.com/omnivore_excerpt.pdf). It is no surprise, given this history, that corn has been crowned the crop of choice when it comes to bio-fuel.