The price of tortillas in Mexico has tripled in recent months and Ruth Gidley in a piece entitled 'As biofuels boom, will more go hungry' is blaming ethanol.
With US government greenhouse policy and the price of oil favoring a shift to ethanol, the price of corn is climbing. The US produced 24percent more ethanol in 2006 than in 2005.
Corn is a main ingredient of tortillas as well as ethanol.
The Mexican government responded to rioting in January by capping the price of corn.
Is concern over global warming or the price of oil, or both, driving the demand for ethanol which is making food more expensive in places like Mexico?
Only advice I have Ann is don't ask Greenpeace and don't ask Monsanto. Speak to the people who have the choice to use them or not and the ones that know their environment the best - farmers, and make that the smartest ones.
We are running out of time though! In fact the US ethanol push is largely fast tracking our way to a die off and I say that to shock because people need to be shocked. I guarantee when this happens we won't be hung up on on the plight of the endangered blue eyed scarlet singing bird, it will be on number one or the irrational instinct, as Sigmund Freud so perceptively points out.
Good luck in your research Ann. Good on you for seeking the truth but know the truth may be far scarier than you may have wanted to know. Marry a farmer and you'll never go wanting for food ... Ha! Actually the analysts are calling them the new sheiks ... If it gets to that it will be an ugly world outside of farming I'd say. Eating is the most non negotiable consuming habit that exists.
The prognosis is that the meat production and demand for meat will increase hugely in the future.
From an European view this will mean even a more unsustainable agriculture.
Europeans import 70% of Brazil's soybeans for animal fodder, much of it for milk production.
The milk will also end up in turn in Brazil!
Brazil is a developing country and is in much need of foreign trade and currency and has developed this huge sector in soybean production, (that is devastating for the rainforests), to increase the revenues.
The transports are as well devastating.
I would like to see a list of benefits and drawbacks with GMOs !
Aaron,
According to GP , some weeds in your crops are only good for the wildlife:)
OK, GP thinks this GE issue is a political one. You know about them multinational gigants ,that in the past have been involved in the manufacture of DDT and Agent Orange, they always mention these substances in connection with Monsanto...