"How Biofuels Could Starve the Poor" Foreign Affairs May/June 2007

Notes from an article by C. Ford Runge and Benjamin Senauer:

Corn-based ethanol is becoming more popular because of a combination of high oil prices and government subsidies. Some estimates are that ethanol plants will burn up half of our domestic corn supplies within a few years. Filling the 25-gallon tank of an SUV with pure ethanol requires over 450 pounds of corn (with enough calories to feed one person for a year). What are the possible consequences?

1. As farmers expand production of corn, fewer acres will be planted with other crops, meaning that food prices worldwide will be higher. In 2006, the price of corn flour for tortillas in Mexico doubled partly due to the rise in U.S. corn prices from $2.80 to $4.20.

2. Iowa's pork producers may be forced out of business if they have to compete with ethanol plants for corn supplies. (Much of the corn currently grown in the U.S. is used for feed.)

3. If we gear our agricultural production towards biofuel and oil prices fall, our farmers would be at grea risk. There would be pressure for a massive bailout of an overinvested industry.

4. If poor countries begin to grow cassava (manioc) for biofuel production, a basic food source would be threatened. Cassava now provides 1/3 of the caloric needs of the people of Sub-Saharan Africa. It is the food that the poor turn to when they cannot afford anything else. Suppliers from these countries would benefit, but the large producers are likely to be the main beneficiaries.

5. More people in the world may face hunger and starvation. It has been estimated that given the rates of economic and population growth, the number of hungry people in the world would decline by 23% by 2025. If the price of staple foods increases because of demand for biofuels, the projected number of chronically hungry could increase from 625 million to 1.2 billion.


Our dependence on corn and soybeans for biofuel is the result of lobbying on the part of growers and Archer Daniels Midland Company (ADM). Profits have been based on heavy government subsidies, and protective tariffs on cheaper ethanol coming from outside the U.S. The consumer endus up paying.

There are also questions about how green biofuels are. If the entire corn crop of the United States was used to make ethanol, that fuel would replace only 12% of current U.S. gasoline use. A switch to biofuels will not mean energy independence nor will it allow us to exit Middle East politics.

Corn and soybeans are not the most sustainable crops. They require large amounts of fertilizer, pesticides, and fuel to grow, harvest, and dry. Runoff contributes to the degradation of water and contributes to the Gulf of Mexico's "dead zone."

Another concern has to do with gains in terms of "net energy balance"--the ratio of the energy produced to the energy required for production. Ethanol made from cellulose (found in trees, grasses, and other plants) is more efficient, but does not yet have the economy of scale.

One alternative is ethanol produced from sugar cane, which has a higher efficiency ratio and is not a staple crop. Brazil currently produces approximately the same amount of ethanol as the United States, but derives almost all of it from sugar cane. A focus on sugar cane might also benefit poorer producer countries.

So what is the alternative to the alternative?