Ethanol Fuels Drive Up Food Costs To Poor People

Elaine Meinel Supkis

High energy costs take huge toll on world's poor. Ethanol refining which uses corn as its base is driving up the price of corn worldwide. Also, the Russian/Belarus fight over oil and gas pipelines heats up even more while western media misunderstands what is going on there.

&hearts Feeding our cars means starving the world's poor.

dpa German Press Agency
Published: Sunday January 14, 2007

By Franz Smets,

Mexico City- Rising maize prices on world markets over the last few months have had worrying consequences for Mexico with the country's staple, the maize tortilla, becoming considerably more
expensive.

Mexicans now pay up to 15 pesos (1.42 dollars) for one kilogram of the thin maize flat bread, almost twice as much as previously.

The left-wing opposition has lost no time in organizing protests against the acting government, which has been in place since last December.

Mexico just had a very ditzy election. The northern states supposedly voted for the right winger ruling elite who is now starving the people there to death. I thought that election was fake and now as the people are suffering from raging inflation of their basic foods, there will certainly be unrest. The solution is for Mexico to buy expensive American corn and hide the price increase temporarily. After that breaks down, they will simply use the military to kill anyone who dares complain. I have been 100% against biofuels from day one because this means working people as slaves and then starving them to death just so we can tool around at 80 mph in big, fat SUVs. This disgusts me no end.

Importing more American corn will also destroy the livelyhood of Mexican farmers who compete with American corn growers. This is why many of these issues are really classic "Between a rock and a hard place."

&hearts This Washington Post article totally misunderstands what the Russians are saying and why they are saying these things.

German Gref, who took part in top-level negotiations that concluded late Friday, said it will take years for Russia to overcome European fears about Moscow's dependability, which had already been damaged by last year's price dispute with Ukraine. That dispute resulted in temporary shortages of Russian gas to European customers.

"The (reputation) that we enjoyed has been undermined to some degree, and it must be repaired" said Gref, Russia's trade and economic development minister. "We must create a system so that supplies depend only on us, not on transit partners."

Far from Russia being abashed and upset with the difficult negoitations with Belarus, they are increasingly daring and belligerent. Namely, they know they hold many cards and will play these ruthlessly. Russia doesn't want the full cost of building new pipelines to rest on their shoulders and these various statements are digs at the western European powers to get moving on this process or else. And I will note that the Russian is blaming Belarus for the loss of trust with Europe.

This is the dopey WP headline:"Russian Official Laments Oil Dispute"

&hearts Here is the Russian news talking about this same matter:

MINSK (AFP) - Belarussian President Alexander Lukashenko has accused Moscow of trying to incorporate his country into Russia, in some of his sharpest comments yet against one-time ally and energy partner Moscow.

Speaking after a bitter oil transit row between the two neighbours, the Belarussian leader referred to a long-standing plan to form a joint state and said Moscow was betraying the spirit of the plan.

He also blasted Sunday a pet Kremlin project, a plan by Gazprom to build a gas pipeline under the Baltic Sea to Germany, which he said was the "most stupid" plan in Russian history.

A bit of bitterness here. Belarus is playing with a weak hand. All they can do is try to invite the USA into occupying them and menacing Russia. Of course, the USA is also going bankrupt trying to put down insurrections in oil pumpiing nations we have invaded and putting down on behalf of Israel and Zionist supporters in the USA, the ever stronger, rapidly growing Islamic rebellions.

One of the hardest facts of life Europe is facing right now: Russia is one of the top 3 energy exporters on earth. This harsh fact upsets many apple carts so the Europeans deal with this by pretending this isn't real. This tendency towards fantasy is very strong in all the dying empires. The Europeans would love to imagine their NATO and European Union entities are as powerful as their previous empires but it is actually more like the medieval Holy Roman Empire which included electing the emperor for the longest time and when the Hohenstaufen family tried to make it hereditary, the Popes destroyed them.

The inability to negoitate with Russia as if Russia is powerful and important is a common thread here. I have noted for years, the arrogant, snide way all the world's leaders approach Russia as well as China, is backfiring badly. First, it has driven both into each other's arms and secondly, it makes them desire revenge rather than friendship.

The Europeans fear Russia but they can't understand how they, themselves have been very dangerous, not to mention utterly destructive, in the past. Today, European and American desires to monopolize the burning of all fossil fuels is making us all very unpopular as the world crawls towards the Hubbert Oil Peak.

This winter, my neighbors and fellow citizens in the Northeast have been spending money on many happy things because it has been ridiculously warm. Tomorrow, the first real cold wave of the year is going to hit with lows in the single digits. Oops. This will drive up world energy prices. It is a sign of increasing instability when warm spells or cold waves can roil all sorts of world markets, not just energy but financial and trade figures.

China is most anxious to lock in as much of the world's energy supplies as possible. Because of this, European attempts at whacking at Russia fail. Every time they sneer at Russia, the bear lumbers off to the Chinese dragon and asks him if he wants the gas and oil. Since the answer is usually 'Yes', this means Europe has no leverage over Russia.

Since Russia's FOREX funds are greater than the USA's, this also means Russia can't be squeezed like they were so easily in the past under Yeltsin. The energy landscape is truly a mountain and we are still climbing it but we are already in the clouds at the top and one can hear people falling off this Hubbert Peak already, their screams echo in the canyons and we can hear it quite well.

But most people in the USA and Europe studiously ignore all this and continue driving upwards.

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Comments

[blues]

This ethanol nonsense is beyond absurd. First of all, as you say, it drives up the cost of food, so poor people go hungry. And growing food is not easy. Crops must be protected from blights, smuts, weevils, rabbits, people, etc. And this means you must hire chemists, biologists, crop dusting planes, guards, etc. Who, of course, need to eat, etc., etc., etc. You will need megatons of fertilizer and insecticides that will run into the rivers and pollute the sea, and will need to be manufactured with vast quantities of oil. And tractors use gas and oil, you know. You will have to support fat insurance and bank officials, since you will have bad years. You will have to pay off fat politicians to keep the INS from arresting you because of your wetbacks.

And most of all, most of all, you are going to need mega-gallons of fresh water. In the eastern states, only some of it will be stolen from the earth. But in the western states, it will be mostly stolen from dwindling aquifers, so you will find yourself in expensive political battles with the drive-by shootists of LA and the slick mobsters of Vegas.

The thing with ethanol is not that it is a good fuel. It has a pathetically low energy yield. I used to pour it in the bathroom sink and light it (careful here!!!) and let it burn languidly at very, very low heat. What is does do is slow down the burn rate of gasoline, giving 'high octane' for poorly designed engines.

Then there are the idiots who drive around burning used French-fry oil. Breathing in all those weird byproducts must be very invigorating!

[DeVaul]

From what I read buried deep in a newspaper article that claimed the dispute had ended, Belarus lost badly. They had to remove the tarrif or lower it greatly, plus they had to sign a three year agreement in which they would give Russia 70% of all profit on refined oil products! This would rise to 85% by the third year! I cannot imagine a more staggering loss, but the article never mentioned that part.

The constant statement that Russia has been undermined because it is not reliable is prepostrous. They are strengthened by the fact that Europe cannot get oil from anyone else -- not undermined.

Again, the Orwellian twisting of words means that language serves no useful purpose here in America.

[blues]

I read the same basic drivel too, DeVaul. I again experienced that uncontrollable crossed-eyes syndrome. If the heartless creeps keep this up, I will need to visit the ophthalmologist in short order.

[Elaine Meinel Supkis]

Heh. When it comes to analyzing diplomatic junk, I'm the queen. This comes from growing up watching 'diplomacy' first hand. Diplomacy grows out of the barrel of a gun or the gas tank, whichever is bigger.

In Russia's case, they have both. Ergo: betting this big gorilla gets its own way is around 100%. The USA isn't a big gorilla anymore, our damn FOREX funds trail behind Russia's and is dwarfed by China's.

This is so simple to understand if one looks at the right things.