global food crisis
Fueling Hunger
Ethanol is traditionally used as an additive to fuel, but these days it's adding to something else: the global food crisis.
Most U.S. ethanol is made from corn, the kind used mostly to make high fructose corn syrup and feed for cattle, chicken and pigs. But it seems a little backwards to devote farmland for fuel when 850 million people go hungry each year, according to the UN, a number expected to increase by 100 million in the next year.
Ethanol’s supporters say its environmental, economic and strategic benefits outweigh any link to higher food prices. The National Corn Growers Association claims greenhouse gases could be reduced by 20 percent if we used 15 billion gallons of ethanol in our cars.
As an example of its economic advantages, The Ethanol Factbook reported that:
A 40 million gallon per year ethanol plant will cost about $60 million to build, expand the economic base for the local economy by $110 million, generate an additional $19.6 million in household income, improve the tax revenue for the state and local governments by $1.2 million, and create nearly 700 permanent jobs.
Ethanol also has the potential to reduce our dependence on Middle East oil.
Moreover, many supporters of ethanol claim that there is a very low correlation between higher food prices and expanded ethanol production. “We think that there are enough elements in current commodity markets that resulted in very high prices for cereals and oilseeds and even they would have happened without this hike in biofuel production," says Loek Boonekamp, a top official for the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development.
Skeptics of ethanol say there’s not enough research to prove ethanol is beneficial in the long term, that it is fueling increased food prices, and that ethanol-based corn subsidies help only a select few.
Environmental benefits? Two independent scientists looked at the footprint of biofuels, and found that the way they’re produced creates more harm than good to the environment.
The latest World Bank assessment on rising food prices found that, “Almost all of the increase in global maize production from 2004 to 2007 (the period when grain prices rose sharply) went for biofuels production in the U.S.” The New York Times reported that, “Work by the International Food Policy Research Institute in Washington suggests that biofuel production accounts for a quarter to a third of the recent increase in global commodity prices.”
What’s clear is that ethanol is coming under fire — even here in the U.S. — as food prices climb higher. According to the L.A. Times, “Some analysts believe the rapid increase in the use of corn to make ethanol has left the nation with little room to maneuver through weather-related disasters in the Midwest.”
Economist Jeffery Sachs argues we should redouble scientific efforts to grow biofuels on land that’s not suitable for growing food, but that we should end our “misguided” corn-to-ethanol subsidies. “Farmers hardly need them given world demand for food and feed grains.”
Regardless of the arguments for and against, ending ethanol subsidies may not provide the immediate assistance that UN Chief Ban Ki-Moon is looking for to solve the world’s food crisis. It would take time for farmers to convert their fields. Factor in growing time, and the impact might not be felt for several seasons.
But some experts say the conversions would take immediate pressure off food prices. At the very least, this is a great opportunity for the U.S. government to show that they are concerned about the world's growing hunger.
Frozen Food Prices
Today, Felipe Calderon announced Mexico would freeze prices on 150 basic foods through the end of the year to help ease the pain of rising food prices.
Bring on the Revolution?
Some at the UN Food Summit are suggesting a second green revolution is needed to curb soaring food prices. “The underlying problem is the decline in agricultural productivity growth," said the UN's Lennart Bage. "Unless we reverse that, we’ll be back in the same situation in a few years' time.”
The first Green Revolution transformed developed-country agricultural practices from the 1940s to 1960s and led to increased production. Huge investments in seed research, infrastructure development and technological advancements fueled this transformation.
Increases in output are especially needed in Africa, which is in dire need of updating its farming techniques, improving agricultural technology and increasing the biodiversity of crop output. According to The Economist, several countries at the Summit promised to meet these needs by investing in seed research, building irrigation canals, and promoting the use of fertilizer.
Regulation reform and infrastructure upgrades are also needed. The International Food Policy Research Institute recently released a report saying prices could be cut if governments enforced market regulations. They also suggested African governments should dedicate 10 percent of their budgets to agriculture, and improve poor roads that hinder farmers' ability to get their crops to market.
However, Financial Times points out why a green revolution in Africa may not be easy to pull off. It would most likely require the cultivation of genetically modified crops in a region where many countries have resisted GMO foods. Other concerns involve Africa's diversity of climate and landscapes — farming techniques that work in some places might not work in others. Increasing output would also mean huge investments in irrigation systems. A dependence on rainwater and a lack of irrigation infrastructure has hindered many small farms in Africa.
The first Green Revolution took years to increase agricultural output in developing countries. It may be needed, but engineering a second Green Revolution is a daunting task.
Reviving Farming in Mexico
A small farmer in Oaxaca, Mexico is spreading knowledge of ancient farming techniques to discourage citizens from abandoning their land.
The Mixteca highlands, where Jesús León Santos resides, is home to some of the most barren land in Mexico. However, in the last two decades, León and a group of farmers have worked to reclaim and reforest the land. Farmers are getting bigger yields a reason to stick around by adopting long-discarded farming techniques.
As the land has begun to produce again, Mr. León has reintroduced the traditional milpa, a plot where corn, climbing beans and squash grow together. The pre-Hispanic farming practice fixes nutrients in the soil and creates natural barriers to pests and disease.
Although the yields are tiny in comparison to mechanized, bulk-producing farms located elsewhere, they're enough to provide the option for people to remain on their own land — and in their own country.
Mexican farmers continue to abandon their land and migrate to the U.S., some because their soil is unproductive or they can no longer compete under Nafta. And those who remain face escalating global food prices. As one former Oaxacan farmer put it to AP, "Not only are farmers not growing food, but we are going hungry because we can't afford the foreign food that drove us off our farms."
León’s aspiration is to give options for a better life in Mexico itself. So far, his strategies have given some farmers an opportunity they haven't had in centuries.
For those of you interested in learning more about the Mixteca highlands and how farmers are implementing ancient agricultural practices, check out the book The Other Game: Lessons from How Life is Played in Mexican Villages.
Street violence and frozen chicken
With so much media attention on Cyclone Nargis and the endgame of the Democratic Primary, one story getting inadequate attention is the latest turmoil in Lebanon.
Sectarian strife is nothing new to Lebanon, but at least one Lebanese blogger suggests that the current unrest is being triggered by the recent spike in food prices.
Turning (Food) Crisis Into Opportunity?
Agriculture is not Cameroon’s strong suit, but leaders of the West African country think the current food crisis could provide the impetus to boost domestic food production.
According to IRIN, Cameroon’s government recently put into action an emergency plan to increase local farming.
“My hope is that the current crisis created by high world food prices would end up having a positive impact for Cameroon by forcing us to become an agriculture-based economy,” said Rabelais Yankam Njomou, an advisor on agriculture to the Cameroon government.
According to the article, Cameroon currently uses only about 20 percent of its fertile land; its economy relies heavily on imported food. Even fertilizer is too expensive for most local farmers, but the country's emergency plan calls for subsidized fertilizer and free seed banks.
Cameroon says it wants to become not only self-sufficient, but a major food exporter. Can it truly turn crisis into opportunity?
The Global Food Crisis as a Monetary Phenomenon
The Federal Reserve cut interest rates again on Wednesday in an attempt to stimulate the domestic economy. While the combined impact of another rate cut and the impending arrival of stimulus checks in taxpayers' bank accounts may bode well for American retailers, the rate cut may also exacerbate the global food crisis.
That same day, Soledad Requena was one of 1,000 women banging pots and pans outside Peru's Congress, protesting soaring food prices. If the government can't increase subsidies on products like rice, bread and meat, she asked, "Where will we go to eat?"
How does cutting short term interest rates effect international food prices? Read more...
Food Crisis Called 'Silent Tsunami'
For months we have been following increasingly urgent reports about food scarcity, rising prices and vulnerable populations. Last week, the World Food Program said the crisis is a silent tsunami that is "threatening to plunge more than 100 million people on every continent into hunger."
The World Food Program says it has never seen a crisis of this proportion. Analysts expect it will be difficult to reverse in the short term. The Financial Times says humanitarian aid at levels comparable to Indonesia's 2004 tsunami response will be needed to prevent the starvation of millions.
For Mercy Corps the increase in food prices is hurting the very people our program staff around the world are working to support.
Reports from those working most closely with affected communities confirm that the situation is dire — and has the potential to grow much worse.
Penny Anderson, Mercy Corps' food security program officer, told OPB radio: "I've been working with Mercy Corps for over eight years now and I have never seen anything like it."
In Niger, prices of bread, powdered milk and wheat flour have spiked, exacerbating the West African nation's precarious food situation. Currently about two-thirds of the population is at serious risk, with shortages pushing the country closer to famine.
In Syria, spiraling food prices have forced Mercy Corps to cut back on the amount of food we can buy and distribute to hundreds of Iraqi refugee families.
In Tajikistan, where Mercy Corps recently distributed blankets and generators to help residents keep warm during an unusually harsh winter, about 40 percent of households in the Rasht Valley are down to no more than one warm meal a day. Neighboring Kazakhstan has suspended wheat exports — shutting off Tajikistan's primary supply of the grain.
Like several other humanitarian aid agencies, Mercy Corps has established a Global Food Crisis fund to help its field teams respond to needs arising from the worst global food crisis in recent memory.
Food or Fuel?
This short segment from Reuters discusses the impact of rising food prices on standards of living around the world. This is a terrific snapshot overview of the dynamics at play in the current world food crisis.
Short-Term Crises, Long-Term Hope
Rising global food prices pose a very real threat to political stability and individual well-being in many developing countries. Recent unrest in Haiti and Egypt indicate an increasingly widespread trend — in fact, the World Bank has identified 33 countries at risk of public disorder.
But what should be done? The Times of London argues that investing in agricultural infrastructure and allowing producers free access to world markets — by both developed as well as developing countries — is the only real solution.
Hunger's New Face
U.N. and World Bank officials say "the perfect storm" of factors has led to skyrocketing food prices, leading to riots in places in Haiti.
Haitians took to the streets this week, with The Times Online reporting that protesters compared their hunger pangs to the burn of battery acid. U.N. Peacekeepers used rubber bullets in attempt to control the situation.
The riots in Haiti are not the first uprisings over food prices, which have risen 65 percent in the last six years. There have been riots in Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Egypt, Indonesia, Ivory Coast, Mauritania, Mozambique, and Senegal. A survey by the Washington-based International Food Policy Research Institute says staple foods have risen by 80 percent since 2005. The price of rice is at its highest in the last 19 years and wheat is at a 28-year high.
“There is a risk that this unrest will spread in countries where 50 to 60 percent of income goes to food,” FAO Director-General Jacques Diouf told The Times Online. “This is due to higher demand from countries like India and China, where GDP grows at 8-10 percent and the increase in income is going to food.”
A New Kind of Appeal
It's hard not to notice that gas prices seem to rise by the day. Most drivers may cringe a little more every time they fill up, but they aren't rioting in the streets. This isn't the story in some developing countries, where increasing oil prices — on top of soaring food prices — have increased the potential for widespread hunger.
To cope, the UN World Food Programme has launched an emergency appeal for $500 million. The WFP is the world’s largest humanitarian agency, working in 78 of the world’s poorest countries to help stop hunger. Funded entirely by individual donors and governments, the appeal was written to 60 governments in hopes to reach their goal by May 1. If this amount isn’t reached, the WFP will be forced to cut aid to countries in already desperate situations.
Although the WFP has launched many appeals in the past, this is the first time an appeal has been launched due to a market-generated crisis. The WFP says it was not prepared for the rise in staple food prices such as wheat and corn, as well as fuel.
NPR pointed out this morning that the food-price hikes are exacerbated by a shortage of rice due to bad harvests and growing demand. Rice-exporting countries in Asia are shipping less abroad to have enough of the dietary staple at home.
Hunger Set to Increase
The UN head of food and agriculture, Jacques Diouf, is urging oil-producing countries to reinvest oil revenues into local agricultural programs out of concern for rising food prices. The oil-rich countries termed by the UN the Near East (which includes most North African and Middle Eastern countries) has seen steady declines in agriculture productivity during the last two decades, and external food aid has dropped significantly as well. However, according to the FAO, the number of undernourished people in the region has grown from 33 million in the early 1990s to over 100 million by 2004.
With plans to feed as many as 73 million people this year, the UN World Food Program is alarmed by recent price increases, according to the New York Times editorial, "Priced Out of the Market". Increasing food prices in themselves are not extraordinary, but the fact that grain and wheat producers, among others, are shifting their effort away from food to alternative energy production will dangerously complicate the situation - higher prices combined with a global food shortage will prove deadly.
The FAO's Hunger Map shows that most of the countries with the most dire need for food aid are not high producers themselves. While Near Eastern countries are still able to find enough food resources to feed their people right now, the Financial Times quotes Mr. Diouf's warning that “it is a difficult balance for governments to respond to the need of their populations by importing food at very high prices, and also to ensure that the poorest of their populations get access to food at reasonable prices.”
Cost of Rice Latest Indicator of Food Risk
Rising rice prices have created new problems for those countries, mostly in Asia, which depend on a large, inexpensive supply of the food, according to the Financial Times. This week, prices hit a 20-year high, "prompting importing countries to seek assurances on supplies."
Analysts have attributed the surge in rice prices to bad weather that has hit supply; urbanisation that has cut the acreage given over to cultivating the grain; and strong demand on the back of rapid income growth in China, India and other Asian countries...Asia has not known famines since the 1970s, and recent price rises for rice and other basic foodstuffs have sparked unrest.
UN Plans to Ration Food Aid
The UN is preparing plans to ration its food aid to people in need if new donations don't provide more money soon, according to an article in the Financial Times this week. Rising global food prices are putting serious pressures on the World Food Program (WFP)'s budget, to the tune of several million dollars each week.
"The WFP crisis talks come as the body sees the emergence of a "new area of hunger" in developing countries where even middle-class, urban people are being "priced out of the food market" because of rising food prices.
The warning suggests that the price jump in agricultural commodities - such as wheat, corn, rice and soyabeans - is having a wider impact than thought, hitting countries that have previously largely escaped hunger."
It is not just the UN that will have to ration its food aid. Countries like Egypt and Pakistan are reinstating or strengthening rationing systems for the first time in decades. Unfortunately, the crisis will be getting worse in the short term. According to the US Department of Agriculture "high agricultural commodities prices [will] continue for at least the next two to three years."
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