- Food Price Facts
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- Quotes
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There are a number of factors contributing to higher food prices including higher energy costs, growing global food demand and changing weather patterns. However, policies for subsidizing and mandating the conversion of corn to fuel are the only part of the food inflation equation that Congress controls.
Last year, food-to-fuel policies led to ¼ of U.S. corn being turned into ethanol. That number will rise to over 30% this year. By 2012 as much as 40% of our corn and 30% of our vegetable oils could be be diverted to fuel production.
This diversion of food crops is reducing the supply of food and feed and contributing to food price inflation. Today, food prices in the US are rising at twice the rate of inflation. Globally, food prices rose 83% in the last 3 years.
Congress and the Administration need to reduce our dependence on food as an energy source and to accelerate the development of alternative fuels that do not pit out energy needs against the needs of the hungry.
Quotes:
“And what I've said is top priority is making sure people are able to get enough to eat. If it turns out we need to make changes in our ethanol policy to help people get something to eat, that has got to be the step we take…We have rising food prices around the United States. In other countries, we're seeing riots because of the lack of food supply, so this is something we're going to have to deal with."- Barack Obama (D-IL) on Meet the Press, Sunday, May 4, 2008
"Although many factors may contribute to high food costs, food-to-fuel mandates are the only factors that can be reconsidered in light of current circumstances… American families are feeling the strain of these food-to-fuel mandates in the grocery aisle and are growing concerned about the emerging environmental concerns of growing corn-based ethanol."- Letter to the EPA signed by 24 U.S. Senators including Sen. John McCain (R-AZ)
The U.S. biofuels program represents a "huge blow to the world food supply." - Jeffrey Sachs, Economist
"The country has to assess the effect... on the overall set of humanitarian issues in terms of the price of food products." - Robert Zoellick, World Bank President