Food Crisis & Biofuels

Food Crisis & Biofuels
Posted March 7th, 2008 by johttp://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2008/mar/07/scienceofclimatechange.foo...

Food crisis will take hold before climate change, warns chief scientist

· Pressures from population growth and affluence
· 'Profoundly stupid' to cut down forests for biofuels

* James Randerson, science correspondent
* The Guardian,
* Friday March 7 2008

Food security and the rapid rise in food prices make up the "elephant in the room" that politicians must face up to quickly, according to the government's new chief scientific adviser.

In his first major speech since taking over, Professor John Beddington said the global rush to grow biofuels was compounding the problem, and cutting down rainforest to produce biofuel crops was "profoundly stupid".

He told the Govnet Sustainable Development UK Conference in Westminster: "There is progress on climate change. But out there is another major problem. It is very hard to imagine how we can see a world growing enough crops to produce renewable energy and at the same time meet the enormous increase in the demand for food which is quite properly going to happen as we alleviate poverty."

He predicted that price rises in staples such as rice, maize and wheat would continue because of increased demand caused by population growth and increasing wealth in developing nations. He also said that climate change would lead to pressure on food supplies because of decreased rainfall in many areas and crop failures related to climate. "The agriculture industry needs to double its food production, using less water than today," he said. The food crisis would bite more quickly than climate change, he added.

But he reserved some of his most scathing comments for the biofuel industry, which he said had delivered a "major shock" to world food prices. "In terms of biofuels there has been, quite properly, a reaction against it," he said. "There are real problems with unsustainability."

Biofuel production is due to increase hugely in the next 15 years. The US plans to produce 30bn gallons of biofuels by 2022 - which will mean trebling maize production. The EU has a target for biofuels to make up 5.75% of transport fuels by 2010.

But Beddington said it was vital that biofuels were grown sustainably. "Some of the biofuels are hopeless. The idea that you cut down rainforest to actually grow biofuels seems profoundly stupid."

Before taking over the chief scientist post from Sir David King nine weeks ago, Beddington was professor of applied population biology at Imperial College London. He is an expert on the sustainable use of renewable resources.

Hilary Benn, the environment secretary, said at the conference that the world's population was expected to grow from 6.2bn today to 9.5bn in less than 50 years' time. "How are we going to feed everybody?" he asked.

Beddington said that in the short term, development and increasing wealth would add to the food crisis. "Once you move to [an income of] between £1 a day and £5 a day you get an increase in demand for meat and dairy products ... and that generates a demand for additional grain." Above £5 a day, people begin to demand processed and packaged food, which entails greater energy use. About 2.7bn people in the world live on less than £1 a day.

There would also be increases at the higher end of the wage scale, he said. At present there are 350m households on £8,000 a year. That is projected to increase to 2.1bn by 2030. "It's tremendous good news. You are seeing a genuine prediction from the World Bank that poverty alleviation is actually working."

But he cautioned that the increased purchasing power would lead to greater pressure on food supplies. Global grain stores are currently at the lowest levels ever, just 40 days from running out. "I am only nine weeks into the job, so don't yet have all the answers, but it is clear that science and research to increase the efficiency of agricultural production per unit of land is critical."

Beddington's in-tray

Animal diseases
Surveillance for bird flu, foot and mouth disease, bovine TB, bluetongue and others will need to be maintained.

Nuclear power
The chief scientist will have a key role in implementing the policy to plug the energy gap when existing power stations reach the end of their lives.

Severn barrage
The government is reviewing the feasibility of a tidal barrage in the Severn estuary which could provide 5% of the country's energy needs.

GM crops
Senior government sources hinted last year that they wanted to expand the planting of GM crops.

UK astronauts
The government has all but closed the door on the prospect of a UK astronaut corps in the near future. But there is still a strong lobby for it from some scientists as a way to enthuse the public about science.

Food Crisi Flickr

  Uploaded on September 5, 2007
by andy_atsaka

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The crisis in Flickr

People pushing and yelling after hours of waiting in line for subsidized bread loafs. Bread crisis exploded in Egypt recently after prices of all food commodities crazily increased. Bread, remained the only thing to fill a hungry poor stomach for PT5. Today $1 = LE 5.5 while LE1 = PT 100 or 20 bread loafs.
Photo by Nora Younis taken on March 24, 2008.

Uploaded on March 26, 2008
by Nora Younis

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German minister calls for biofuel rethink over rising food prices

Washington - German Development Minister Heidemarie Wieczorek-Zeul said Saturday in Washington ahead of a World Bank meeting that the world needed to reconsider the use of biofuels amid skyrocketing food prices. "The targets for (fuel) blends must be put to the test," she said ahead of the spring meeting of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) in the US capital. Increasing production of biofuels was 30 to 70 per cent responsible for the rapid rise in food prices, she said. Dearer food was "a danger for growth, combatting poverty, stability and peace in the world," she said. High prices for food had led to riots, looting and violence in many mainly poor countries. 

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Street riots continue in Haiti

Street riots continue in Haiti

April 12, 2008, 18:45
By Thami Dickson
The United Nations (UN) Security Council has raised fears that the violence that has erupted in the Caribbean Island of Haiti is posing a threat of reversing all the progress made by the world body in stabilising that country.

Protests against the rising food prices turned violent in Haiti with demonstrators burning vehicles and attacking UN peacekeepers. They brought the capital to a standstill and tried to storm the presidential palace in demand of government action over the costs of food.

Haiti is one of the poorest countries in the world where 80% of the population lives on less than two dollars a day.

The UN Security Council deplored the violence and has pledged to support the Haitian government in its efforts to stabilise the country.

COMMENT: AL JAZEERA reporting the PM of Haiti has resigned.

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Food Chaos in Haiti

Haiti Riots Over Spike in Food Prices

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News & Notes , April 11, 2008 · In Haiti, a drastic increase in food prices sparked deadly rioting over the last three days. Protesters in the capitol are calling for President Rene Preval to step down. United Nations troops have restored some calm, and the U.S. Coast Guard is on alert for a migrant exodus.

NPR's Tony Cox talks with Mara Schiavocampo, digital correspondent for NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams, who is in Port-au-Prince.

 

NOTE: Al Jazeera is now reporting the PM of Haiti has resigned over the crisis.

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UN food agency: Soaring food prices to persist

Millions worldwide are vulnerable; developing nations especially at risk

ROME - Even with bigger crops, soaring food prices that have sparked unrest across the globe are likely to persist, threatening millions of people worldwide, a U.N. agency said Friday.

Prices of bread, rice, milk, cooking oil and other basic foodstuffs have sharply increased in the past months in many developing countries, according to a report by the Rome-based Food and Agriculture Organization. Prices of wheat and rice have doubled compared to last year, while those of corn are more than a third higher.

Grain prices have risen as a result of steady demand, especially from China and India, supply shortages and new export restrictions, FAO said.

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Opinion: Time for a Biofuel Ban?

Currently western governments are experimenting with bio-fuels as a way to cushion their economies from the impact of rising oil prices.  Prices of a gallon of fuel continue to rise sharply showing that the emergence of a bio-fuel craze has done little to reduce global dependence on oil.  But the bio-fuel craze has seemed to raise a new specter that may be much worse than global warming: sudden mass starvation hitting much of the third world.

The current global food crisis is as sudden as it is alarming.  It is a mixture of a number of root causes: neglected inflation that governments have hidden for decades in changing statistics, weak economy, global climate change, rising fuel costs and bio-fuels.  Of these only 2 have short term solutions.  Oil prices are rising in large part because the United States is slowly reducing Iraq to chaos and a step down from American arrogance could do much to take the pressure off, but rising demand will continue to cause fuel costs for farmers to go up.  Bio-fuel programs could be ended tomorrow.

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Food prices stir poverty concern

The price of coarse rice, the staple food of poor Bangladeshis, has more than doubled in a year [EPA

The International Monetary Fund has said that rising food prices threaten to undermine gains made in cutting poverty and further strain a global economy already hit by a financial crisis.   The warning comes after riots related to increasing food prices rocked Haiti and Egypt. The increases are caused, in part, by drought in Australia and in central Europe, and more demand for food in increasingly Asian countries, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, IMF managing director, said on Thursday. Strauss-Kahn's comments came on the eve of a meeting of finance ministers and central bank chiefs of the Group of Seven industrial countries in Washington DC.   Biofuels link   The increased use of grains to produce biofuels, first heralded as a way to cut greenhouse gases, combined with increased demand for food in emerging market economies, is contributing to grain shortages and food riots.   In video Starvation fears in Bangladesh "Food prices, for instance, increased by 48 per cent since the end of 2006 until now, which is a huge increase, and it may undermine all the gains we have obtained in reducing poverty", Strauss-Kahn said.   Riots over food price rises began in southern Haiti earlier this week and quickly spread to the capital Port-au-Prince, where tens of thousands took to the streets.   Four were killed in the disturbance, while UN peacekeepers drove away rioters used rubber bullets and tear gas to drive away rioters from the presidential palace.   Food prices, which have risen 40 per cent on average globally since mid-2007, are most damaging to poor nations such as Haiti, the poorest country in the Americas.   Hunger palliative   Most Haitians live on less than $2 a day, while reports indicate the most desperate have been forced to turn to a traditional hunger palliative of cookies made of dirt, vegetable oil and salt.   Meanwhile, at least seven people have died in Egypt in riots earlier this week, sparked partly by rises in the price of bread.   Similar riots have been reported in Burkina Faso, Mauritania, Indonesia and Peru.    UN peacekeepers have had to be called in to control Haitians rioting over price rise [AFP] Robert Zoellick, World Bank president, said on Thursday that while developed nations struggled with high fuel cost of fuel to run their cars, poor people in developing nations were struggling to feed themselves.   "In many developing countries, the poor spend up to 75 per cent of their income on food. When prices of basic foods rise, it hits hard", he said.   "In just two months, rise prices have skyrocketed to near historic levels, rising by around 75 per cent globally and more in some markets - with more to come."   Zoellick said the world needs to recognise food price inflation is contributing to a growing emergency, one which the UN World Food Programme has said requires $500 million just to fill immediate need.    Persistent inflation    The World Bank say food price inflation is not a short-term phenomenon but will likely persist through 2008 and 2009 before demand slackens due to high prices.   Most people in the world's wealthiest countries take food for granted.   Even the poorest fifth of households in the US spend only 16 per cent of their budget on food.   Rising bread prices in Egypt have contributed to protests that led to several deaths [EPA] By contrast, Nigerian families spend 73 per cent of their budgets to eat, Vietnamese 65 per cent, while Indonesians allocate half.   Last year, the food import bill of developing countries rose by 25 per cent as food prices rose to levels not seen in a generation.   World financers have also been adding to the food price problem.   Commodities, as an asset class, have attracted investors looking not only for a safe haven from the carnage in highly leveraged mortgage investments.   From 2005 through 2007, world wheat prices rose 70 per cent, corn gained 80 per cent, and dairy prices nearly doubled, up 90 pe rcent. A senior UN official has said that global investment funds and the weak dollar are largely to blame for the world's rise in food prices. 'Speculative attack' "The crisis is a speculative attack and it will last", said Jose Graziano, the UN food and farm organisation's regional representative for Latin America and the Caribbean. "The lack of confidence in the (US) dollar has led investment funds to look for higher returns in commodities ... first metals and then foods." "In many developing countries, the poor spend up to 75 percent of their income on food." Robert Zoellick, World Bank President  Investors have speculated in commodities including wheat, corn and rice because stocks in recent years have been drawn down by rising demand in emerging markets and supply shortages due to adverse climate in key producer nations, Graziano said. The move from greenhouse gas-emitting hydrocarbons to biofuels is also contributing to high food prices, but it is not driven by market forces alone. The IMF has calculated that corn ethanol production in the US accounted for at least half the rise in world corn demand in each of the past three years. Washington provides a subsidy of 51 cents a gallon to ethanol blenders and slaps a tariff of 54 cents a gallon on imports. In the European Union, most countries exempt biofuels from some gas taxes and slap an average tariff equal to more than 70 cents per gallon of imported ethanol.

Source: Agencies

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Indian PM expresses concern over rising food and commodity prices

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said rising food prices would make inflation control a more difficult task and it has the potential to derail economic reforms.

"We in India too are deeply concerned about rising global commodity and food prices a steep rise in food price will make inflation control more difficult and can thereby hurt the cause of macroeconomic stability. The constituency for economic reforms, so necessary for growth, would also diminish," the Prime Minister said at a global agro-industries forum on Thursday.

He said the pressures would mount for restrictive trade practices to deal with rising food prices.

 

However, Singh ruled out the return to an era of "blind controls".

"We cannot react to such a situation by depressing agriculture's terms of trade," he said.

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Soaring Food Prices Unleash Chaos

The World Bank calls for leaders to take action as violent protests against the high cost of grains and other foods are seen around the globe

The scenes in Haiti have been dramatic. Gunfire on the streets in the capital Port-au-Prince; thousands parading through the streets; and 9,000 United Nations peacekeepers powerless to stop the violence and the widespread looting. Five people have been killed in the violence since last Thursday, according to unofficial reports. Even an impassioned plea by the Caribbean country's President Rene Preval on Wednesday failed to restore order.

"The solution is not to go around destroying stores," he said. "I'm giving you orders to stop."

Haitians, though, are reacting to problems that cannot simply be wished away. Food prices across the globe have been skyrocketing in recent years. Rice prices in Asia have spiked as has the price of bread in Egypt, milk products in Europe and pasta in Italy. The result has been unrest in a number of countries and many more concerned that a mass protest is but a price hike away.

Now, World Bank President Robert Zoellick has called on world leaders to act to ease the global food crisis. Zoellick urged the United States, the European Union, Japan and other developed countries to help plug a $500 million (€319 million) shortfall in the United Nations' World Food Program. In a speech given in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday, Zoellick said the money was urgently needed to meet emergency demands and warned that if politicians did not act now, "many more people will suffer and starve."

Unrest triggered by the higher food and fuel prices has been gaining steam across the globe in recent weeks. During a two-day riot in Egypt earlier this week, one person was killed. Cameroon has also seen street violence. In the Philippines, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo warned on Tuesday that rice shortages were exacerbating political and social tensions in the country.

Zoellick, who was speaking in the run-up to the World Bank's spring meeting this weekend, said world leaders needed to develop a new mechanism that focused not only on hunger, malnutrition and access to food and its supply, but also on the connections between energy, crop yields, climate change and other factors.

According to the World Bank president, as financial markets have tumbled, food prices have soared. The prices of some basic staples, such as rice and wheat, have shot up by as much as 80 percent in some places.

The UN estimates that global food prices have risen 65 percent since 2002, with grain rising 42 percent and dairy products 80 percent last year alone. Jacques Diouf, the director-general of the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation warned Wednesday that unrest linked to food and fuel prices, which has been seen in Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Egypt, Indonesia, Ivory Coast, Mauritania, Mozambique and Senegal, could spread to even more countries.

Zoellick said the World Bank, whose main task is to fight poverty in developing countries, estimated "that 33 countries around the world face potential conflict and social unrest because of the acute hike in food and energy prices." In countries where food made up half to three-quarters of consumer spending, "there is no margin for survival," he said.

According to Zoellick, high and volatile food prices will continue for years, because of growing populations, changing diets, rising energy prices, the emergence of biofuels that force farmers to choose between lucrative fuel crops and foodstuffs, and climate change.

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown also urged world leaders to intervene to tackle rising food scarcity. In a letter released Thursday, he writes about the urgent need to address rising food prices and the impact of biofuel production on agriculture. "Rising food prices threaten to roll back progress we have made in recent years on development," Brown wrote. "For the first time in decades, the number of people facing hunger is growing."

Provided by Spiegel Online—Read the latest from Europe's largest newsmagazine

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Poor Farmers Commit Suicide in India

LUCKNOW — Authorities in northern India have banned the sale of a cheap variety of hair dye after debt-ridden farmers were found to be drinking it to end their lives, an official said Friday.

At least 11 farmers have died from swallowing the hair dye in a drought-hit region of Uttar Pradesh state in the past three months, said Rajiv Agarwal, a senior state official.

Two-thirds of India's 1.1 billion people depend on agriculture, and most have been left out of India's economic boom. In parts of western and southern India, the dire economic state of farmers has been blamed for thousands of suicides in recent years.

The hair dye leads to kidney failure, said Ganesh Kumar, principal of the Maharani Lakshmi Bai Medical College.

"We have banned the sale of the cheap dye made locally in Uttar Pradesh state," Agarwal told The Associated Press.

The state's rugged Bundelkhand region has been battling a severe drought caused by the failure of monsoon rains for the past four years.

"The farm lands have turned barren. An exodus of people has begun — the young have migrated to nearby cities, leaving behind women and elderly people," Agarwal said. The region is about 200 miles southwest of Lucknow, the capital of Uttar Pradesh state.

Last month, India's federal government announced plans to cancel debts due on or before Dec. 31, 2007, for poor farmers with land holdings of up to five acres. The move is expected to benefit about 4 million farmers.

Poor farmers often borrow money from banks or private lenders to buy seeds and meet family expenses. Some commit suicide after failing to repay the loans because of crop failures.

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Inflation and Rising Food Prices Lead to Riots in Haiti, Cairo, Next, Revolution?

Inflation and Rising Food Prices Lead to Riots in Haiti, Cairo, Next, Revolution?

There is no faster way to make someone angry than to reach into their wallet. To add fuel to the fire, steal the money that would have paid for their dinner, and catastrophe ensues.

A downright frightening facet of the global economic downturn is rising inflation. Some people—wealthy, the middle class in industrialized countries—can deal with the spike in the price, say, of rice. However, most of the world, lest it be forgotten that more than ten billion live on less than $2 a day, cannot simply buy a 36-inch instead of a 42-inch flatscreen television to balance the budget. The proof?

Food riots.

In the streets of Haiti, the most destitute state in the Americas, exactly such a disaster is taking place right now. In Cairo, where corruption had already mangled the bread industry, rising food prices have set off unrest there as well. Both countries are desperately poor; while there are nice hotels in Cairo, more than 74 million Egyptians live on less than $1 a day. People have also gone from wits end to violence in Cameroon and Cote d'Ivoire. Protests have hit Uzbekistan, Yemen, Bolivia and Indonesia.

The venerable World Food Programme of the United Nations, which feeds more than 70 million people every day, is now starved for cash and suppliers. World Bank President Robert Zoellick, after asking rich countries to go above and beyond for another $500 for WFP, said, "While many worry about filling their gas tanks, many others around the world are struggling to fill their stomachs."

Remember that unreasonable bread prices was an instigator of the French Revolution. From "A Popular History of France," by Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot, "We could see the French flying over the roads, across fields and through hedges, in such numbers that the sight must have been seen to be believed.  There were in the outskirts of our town and in the neighboring villages, so vast a multitude of knights and men-at-arms tormented with hunger, that it was a matter horrible to see. They gave their arms to get bread."

A riot of desperation may unsettle Port-au-Prince, and Haitians are targeting President René Préval. From the Associated Press, "We heard the speech, but the speech is empty," said student protest organizer Herve Saintiles, 37. "We are going to hold the president responsible for all these problems." Holding officials responsible is one thing, revolution is quite another.

Perhaps the scarcity of resources, as a Malthusian demand of people around the world, has now become one of the defining characteristics of this globalized planet, one that stands in stark contrast to the French aristocracy two centuries ago.

And if revolution came in Cairo, in Port-au-Prince, or in Yaoundé, would we even want to see where it was headed?

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Biofuels 'aggravating' food prices says Brown

Biofuels 'aggravating' food prices says Brown


UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown has written to fellow G8 leaders about his concerns that the rush towards biofuels to replace fossil fuels such as petroleum is "aggravating" global demand for food.

In a letter sent to Japanese Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda on Wednesday (9 April), Mr Brown wrote: "There is growing consensus that we need urgently to examine the impact on food prices of different kinds and production methods of biofuels, and ensure that their use is responsible and sustainable."

The British prime minister wrote that he is concerned that the rapid rise in food prices has lead to a wave of riots in the developing world in recent weeks. His letter was also sent to UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon, the head of the IMF and the head of the World Bank.

The town of Hokkaido, Japan is set to host the 2008 G8 meeting in July, where the British prime minister wants his fellow G8 leaders to put together a package to deal with food security.

"Increased wealth and growing populations in developing countries contribute to steadily increasing global demand for grains, for food and animal feed, aggravated by rapidly increasing biofuel production," says the UK letter.

Specifically, Mr Brown suggested that the UN, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund work together around the areas of trade, production, technology, financial initiatives and food aid.

"Rising food prices threaten to roll back progress we have made in recent years on development. For the first time in decades, the number of people facing hunger is growing," he said.

Meanwhile, on the same day, the president of the European Commission refused to concede that the growth in biofuel production, still less EU support for the alternative fuel source, had any effect on food prices.

"The reasons for the price increases at the global level are very complex," said President Jose Manuel Barroso, speaking to reporters, "but the impact of biofuels is not significant."

Rather, argued the president, the crisis in food prices is being caused primarily by export restrictions on grains by Ukraine and Russia – two of the biggest cereal producers in the world.

EU leaders in Spring last year agreed that the EU should increase the use of biofuels in transport fuel to 10 percent by 2020, up from a planned 5.75 percent target to be achieved by 2010.

World Bank issues biofuel concerns
But the commission's position on biofuels is growing increasingly isolated. The latest international bodies to issue concerns about the effects of the alternative energy source are the World Bank, the FAO and the India-Africa Forum.

On Wednesday, the World Bank issued a policy note that stated: "Increased biofuel production has contributed to the rise in food prices."

The Bank says that other possible causes for the rise in food prices that have been considered, such as droughts in Australia and poor crops in the EU and Ukraine in 2006 and 2007, were largely offset by good crops and increased exports in other countries and would not, on their own, have had a significant impact on prices.

Only a relatively small share of the increase in food production prices (around 15 percent) is due directly to higher energy and fertiliser costs, says the report.

Also on Wednesday, the head of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), Jaques Diouf, warned the food riots could spread and spoke of an "emergency."

Adding to the chorus of voices speaking out against biofuels, Indian and African leaders at the first ever India-Africa summit yesterday called on Western countries to reconsider their support for biofuels.

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World Food Crisis Blog

This blog is intended to monitor the world food crisis of 2008.