Ok, so we all know that Al Gore has gotten the world to agree that Global Warming is our number 1 priority. He also has pitched the theory that Global Warming is going to lead to famine. Is is possible that the push to use bio-fuels as alternatives to fossil fuels will push us to a global food shortage sooner?
I was sitting at work reading an article (sometimes work does not seem like work except for the topics that I have to read about) and it is talking about agriculture prices. The oil folks are starting to worry, both the food oil and the fossil fuel oil folks, that the demand for vegetable oils and oilseeds could lead to a food shortage.
It is a good counter-point that global warming may not bring on a food shortage, but the demand for bio-fuels in order to curtail global warming could drive us into a food shortage much faster. Cotton is approaching $0.80/lb but corn is up 50% over what it was last year which was enough to drive cotton acreage down by 29%. Corn stocks to use ratio is approaching an all time low, even with the record corn productions. European feed-wheat production is so low they are using corn for feed which drives the market even more. Corn plantings are expected to go down and switch to soybeans. Soybean prices are 70% higher than last year and climbing. Soybeans are approaching a record low stocks to use ratio as well. Then you get to throw in wheat which is more then double the price it was last year and is now more profitable then corn, soybeans, or cotton to grow. The price of cotton is expected to skyrocket.
China is expected to reduce cotton acreage to plant more soybeans.
Demand for cotton is at an all time high and yet cotton stocks are dwindling……….whacky.
Do you go naked? Starve? Or burn fossil fuels?
And this is why I don’t think ethanol or bio-diesel (made from soy or other plant stock, algae based bio-diesel is different) is a viable solution to the problem. The short sighted concern of global warming due to fossil fuel usage without looking at the whole system is causing much more pressing problems much sooner…………too bad the media is too ignorant to address a complicated problem in an honest way.
1 comment:
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