All Biofuels Are Not The Same - Washington Post

Summary:
Vinod Khosla arguing that a ban on all biofuels would be a mistake. There is room for biofuel crop production without affecting food supply or the environment. E.g. waste from forestry operations, agricultural crop waste, municipal organic waste and sewage. Winter cover crops would use land that sits idle during winter. Reducing the renewable fuel mandates would reduce investment in these alternatives and in improving the quality of cellulosic biofuels. Instead he proposes a policies and an impact rating to incentivise the production of biofuels that are environmentally beneficial. (Published: 16/06/08)

Notes:

• biofuels: refers to a variety of products that vary dramatically in their environmental impact and effects on food prices
• cellulosic ethanol production can reduce carbon emissions 75% while producing ethanol at a lower cost than corn ethanol and gasoline
  
• concerns about amount of water and corn required to produce a gallon of ethanol
• 16-ounce steak takes about the same amount of corn and more water
• ban steaks?
• cellulosic fuels mandate:
  
• congress has required oil refiners and fuel blenders to use up to 36billion gallons of renewable fuels produced in America annually
• attacked by critics
• but: reducing it could be disasterous for energy security and the environment
• better: build flexibility into the standard related to price and availability of cellulosic biofuels
  
• sufficient biomass exists as waste from forestry operations to meet the cellulosic fuels mandate (21 billions) in the 2007 energy bill
• if we include agricultural crop waste, municipal organic waste and sewage, all 36 billion gallons could be produced within 10 years
  
• approaching $1/gallon
• adding winter cover crops to land that sits idle during winter (about half of the land used for agriculture)
• could replace most of our gasoline imports
• could produce 450 million tons of biomass a year within 10 years, and more than 750 million tons by 2030
• not an additional acre of land being used for biofuels
  
• Ed Shafer (US Agriculture Secretary):
• "On the international level, only 3% of the more than 40% increase we have seen in world food prices this year is due to the increased demand on corn for ethanol"
• LECG analysis:
  
• Oil prices affect the US consumer price index for food two to three times as much as corn prices
• Merril Lynch:
• If biofuels were taken off the market, oil prices would climb 15%, putting further upward pressure on food prices
• source of corn and cellulosic ethanol matters
• if ethanol is produced on lands that displace food production into rain forests, its environmental effect will be negative
• need national and international policies that create incentives for countries such as Brazil and Malaysia to preserve their rain forests through carbon credits while banning biofuels from countries that do not meet rain forest deforestation reduction targets
• incentivise production of biofuels that are environmentally beneficial
• e.g. carbon/land/air quality/water impact rating
• if we reduce renewable fuel mandates, we are likely to reduce investment in next-generation cellulosic biofuels
• need to focus on improving the quality of biofuels and reducing our oil dependence
  

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Free the gene genie - FT.com

Summary:
OpEd in the FT arguing that politicians in industrialised countries and green groups can no longer indulge in anti-GM rethoric. World must employ all resources to raise crop yields without using more energy and chemicals. Benefits from GM food are great enough and the food crisis severe enough to make use of them. Friendlier attitude towards GM by the EU is essential for the technology's adoption in Africa. GM on its own cannot transform the world food outlook. Requires overcoming structural deficiencies of agriculture in developing countries. (Published: 07/06/08)

Notes:

• world population is growing faster than agricultural production
• this for the first time in two generations
• food shortages and rising prices the inevitable outcome
• world must employ all the resources of science and technology, including genetic modification, to raise crop yields without using more energy and chemicals
• politicians in industrialised countries with strong environmental lobbies (i.e. Europe)
• could indulge in anti-GM rhetoric as long as most crops were in surplus
• wasn't worth taking any risks by introducing GM crops
• would benefit companies such as Monsanto (and might help farmers) but would do nothing for consumers
• can no longer afford the luxury of dismissing GM
• global evidence of a dozen years growing commercial GM crops shows an overall net benefit, in higher yields and lower inputs
• isolated problems with crop management but no known effects on human health and little impact on biodiversity
• Other changes in agriculture have a far greater potential for environmental damage than genetic modification.
  
• e.g. new cropping and cultivation methods,
• but the world must continue to monitor for unintended consequences from GM crops
• plant metabolism is so complex that scientists cannot predict fully what foreign genes may do
• research is leading to a second generation of GM crops
• with added traits such as drought and salt tolerance, better nutritional content and improved flavour
• will deliver more direct consumer benefits than the first-generation crops
• just kill pests or resist herbicides
• friendlier attitude to GM by the European Union is essential for the technology's adoption in regions such as Africa
• African governments often take their lead on regulatory issues from Europe
• as long as the EU remains hostile, some countries will be reluctant to "contaminate" their farmland with GM crops
• even with government support, introducing appropriate biotech plants to the developing world will be a formidable problem
• scientists will have to listen to poor farmers and develop the crops they want
  
• essential that outsiders do not impose new varieties that turn out to be unsuited to local conditions or prevent farmers saving and planting their own seeds in the traditional way
• GM on its own cannot transform the world food outlook
• overcoming the structural deficiencies of agriculture in developing countries would do more to raise yields
• from poor soil management to inadequate storage facilities
• But: the additional benefits of biotech plants are great enough - and the threat of a global food crisis serious enough - to give them a warm welcome worldwide

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Biotechnology seen as a key to solving food crisis - Reuters

Summary:
Ed Schafer (US Agriculture Secretary) and others at UN Food Summit calling for biotechnology, including genetically-modified organisms (GMOs), to help produce more food by raising yields and producing crops in developing nations that are resistant to disease, pests and environmental damage due to climate change. (Published: 03/06/08)

Notes:

• summit on seeking ways to combat high food prices when climate change may aggravate shortages
  
• Schafer: "Biotechnology is one of the most promising tools for improving the productivity of agriculture and increasing the incomes of the rural poor. We are convinced of the benefits it offers to developing countries and small farmers"
• green groups and Frankenfoods
• green groups say genetically-engineered crops threaten biodiversity
  
• many European consumers are wary of eating products dubbed by critics as "Frankenfoods"
• Schafer: biotechnology, including genetically-modified organisms (GMOs), could help produce more food by raising yields and producing crops in developing nations that are resistant to disease and pests
• Philippine Agriculture Minister Arthur Yap:
  
• "Genetic engineering offers long-term solutions to some of our major crop production problems"
  
• But: not a panacea for all of his country's agricultural problems.
• Progress being made in the Philippines included research into rice and coconuts resistant to disease
• "We're also working on virus-resistant papaya, papaya hybrids with a longer shelf life that should be ready for market in 2009"
• U.N. Climate Panel:
• Climate change could aggravate production around the world with more droughts, floods, disruptions to monsoons and rising sea levels
• In Africa alone, 250 million people could face extra stress on water supplies by 2020.
• Burkina Faso Agriculture Minister Laurent Sedogo
• country has worked with U.S. agriculture group Monsanto to battle pests that blighted the cotton crop
• "We are about to plant 15,000 hectares" of a new crop that was resistant to pests
• would also cut down on the use of pesticides that could damage the health of farmers
• World Bank and aid agencies
  
• estimate that soaring food prices could push as many as 100 million more people into hunger.
  
• About 850 million are already hungry.
• C.S. Karim, an adviser to Bangladesh's agriculture ministry
• A cyclone last year "is a wake-up call for all of us. It shows the vulnerability of Bangladesh. "
• Bangladesh is going ahead with efforts to make crops able to survive floods and more salinity in the soil

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Food crisis is a chance to reform global agriculture - FT.com

Summary:
Martin Wolf on why the price of food has risen and what can be done. Weak growth of supply and strong increases in demand has caused stocks of cereals to drop to lowest levels since 80s. Price hikes not due to speculation. Supply is biggest problem. Prices will remain high until energy prices tumble. Poor most affected. Humanitarian intervention needed. Farming overly regulated. Needs to be market oriented. Move towards genetically modified food in developing countries is inevitable in order to increase productivity.(Published: 29/04/08)

Notes:

• Of the two crises disturbing the world economy - financial disarray and soaring food prices - the latter is the more disturbing
• high food prices threaten unrest at best and mass starvation at worst
• jumps in food prices are part of a wider range of commodity price rises
  
• forces that link prices of energy, industrial raw materials and foodstuffs
• rapid economic growth in the emerging world
• strains on world energy supplies
• the weakness of the US dollar
• global inflationary pressures
• but: food now hotter issue that normal
• questions: why have prices of food risen so strongly? Will these higher prices last? What action should be taken in response?
• demand side:
  
• demand for food raised due to strong rises in incomes per head in China, India and other emerging countries
• notably meat and the related animal feeds
• shifts in land use reduce the supply of cereals available for human consumption
• rising production of subsidised biofuels
• stimulated by soaring oil prices
• boosts demand for maize, rapeseed oil and the other grains and edible oils that are an alternative to food crops
• IMF: "although biofuels still account for only 11/2 per cent of the global liquid fuels supply, they accounted for almost half of the increase in consumption of major food crops in 2006-07, mostly because of corn-based ethanol produced in the US"
• supply side:
• aggregate production of maize, rice and soyabeans stagnated in 2006 and 2007
• partly the result of drought
• partly due to higher prices of oil, since modern farming is so energy-intensive
• cereal stocks have fallen to their lowest levels since the early 1980s
• due to weak growth of supply and strong increases in demand
• undermines belief that speculation has driven the rising prices
• if if prices were above market-clearing levels due to speculation, stocks would be rising, not falling
• biggest problem is is weak medium-term growth of supply
• rapid increases in yields of the 1970s and 1980s (the "green revolution") have slowed
• given the stresses on water supplies, longer-term supply prospects would look poor even if diversion of land for production of biofuels were not adding to the pressure
• Are prices going to remain high?
  
• Two opposing forces are at work
• First force is the market
• will tend to bring prices back down as supplies expand and demand shrinks
• latter is also what we want to avoid, at least in the case of the poor, since reducing their consumption is not so much a solution as a failure
• Second force is the current intense pressure on the world's food system
• true of both demand and costs of supply
• Prices are likely to remain relatively elevated, by historical standards, unless (or until) energy prices tumble
• what is to be done? answers fall into three broad categories:
  
• humanitarian
• important point: higher food prices have powerful distributional effects: they hurt the poorest the most
• Increases in aid to the vulnerable, either as food or as cash, are vital
• Equally important, however, is ensuring that the additional supplies reach those in greatest difficulty.
  
• trade and other policy interventions
  
• Protection, subsidies and other such follies distort agriculture more than any other sector
• rich countries are encouraging, or even forcing, their farmers to grow fuel instead of food
• present crisis is a golden opportunity to eliminate this plethora of damaging interventions
• focus should be on shifting the farm sector towards the market, while cushioning the impact of high prices on the poor
  
• longer-term productivity and production
• far greater resources need to be devoted to expanding long-run supply
• increased spending on research, especially into farming in dry-land conditions
• the move towards genetically modified food in developing countries is as inevitable as that of the high-income countries towards nuclear power
• more efficient use of water, via pricing and additional investment.
  
• "People will oppose some of these policies. But mass starvation is not a tolerable option."

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