Published: May 29, 2008 03:42 pm            

Commentary: The big picture in ‘food vs. fuel’ debate

Originally published in the May 30, 2008, print edition.

When faced with difficult times, it is our basic instinct to try to identify the cause or answers to that difficulty and find a way to address it. Sometimes, we accept the first perceived answer that comes our way, without first looking at the bigger picture or assembling all the facts. Other times, we dig deep and look at all possible factors relating to our difficulty. The latter approach, in most cases, is cumbersome and hard to undertake as it can cause us to look deeper at ourselves and at the world around us.

This is the phenomenon that is taking place right now in the debate over rising food prices. You can’t open a newspaper or turn on the television without hearing a reference to rising food prices, increased commodity prices and biofuels.

I cannot dispute the fact that food costs have risen. Nevertheless, it seems that many who are looking for the cause of rising food costs are looking to the perceived “easy” answer, biofuels, without looking at the complex, global, bigger picture.

One cannot refute that biofuels are one of the factors contributing to the increase in food prices on a global basis. Studies have shown that biofuels contribute between 10 to 30 percent of the increase. Yet, it should be noted, that studies have also shown that oil and gasoline prices would be as much as 15 percent higher if biofuel producers where not increasing their output.

Biofuels, the easy answer, is a safe way for us to use our “human instinct” and point fingers at the limelight cause. By doing this we don’t have to face some of the unpleasant or uncontrollable factors.

The bigger picture is that 70 to 90 percent of contributing factors to increased food prices come from outside the realm of biofuels. These factors include increased petroleum-based energy costs, the weak dollar, increased exports and commodity speculation by outside investors. These answers have been left out of many discussions.

Beyond the above-mentioned big-picture items are some other issues affecting world food supplies. Those issues include growing demand from emerging economies in nations such as China and India; weather-related issues, particularly severe droughts in Australia and China; and growing populations.

Farmers around Minnesota and the United States are concerned about the issue of global hunger. We pride ourselves on providing the safest, most affordable and abundant food and fiber in the world while at the same time helping to reduce our country’s dependency on foreign oil through biofuels production. Now is not the time to turn our backs on renewable energy or broadening our domestic energy policy. Rising global food prices is a complex issue that needs to be addressed with long-term, big-picture solutions that do not intervene with markets.

        

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