Sky News business editor Michael Wilson
It's surely an unsustainable contest between driving and starving.
The World Bank warned that the rapid rise in food prices could force 100 million people deeper into poverty.
Meanwhile, the United States, the world's biggest granary no longer has surplus grain to export, because most of its spare crop is being turned into ethanol for cars.
Australia, another major grain producer, has been through a severe drought, which has devastated its production.
But the green pressure to supply bio-fuels will only increase. From tomorrow, bio-fuel will comprise two thirds of your tank - the EU has a 2020 target for biofuels of 10% of all vehicle fuel.
One 'agriconomist' has calculated that means a quarter of all European arable land will have to be turned over to producing bio-fuels.
Add this to the equation - three quarters of the world's population eat rice,and are paying at least three quarters more for it than they they were a year ago.
Vietnam, Egypt and India have already begun to restrict their exports to feed domestic demand.
It's the result of industrial growth. The dramatic improvement in lifestyle of millions of Indians and Chinese has fuelled a demand for meat and milk - China in particular eats twice as much meat as it did twenty years ago, and that needs twice as much animal feed. And so on.
In recent weeks there have been food riots in Haiti, India and Mexico as well as warning signs of unrest in Jamaica, Nepal and sub-Saharan Africa.
As worrying are the Chinese, Korean and Japanese companies preparing to grab for fertile land wordlwide. Japan already owns three times as much farmland abroad as it has on its own shores.
Should we really be turning food into fuel just to satisfy the green concerns of the fortunate few?
WAKE UP HUMANITY!!!!
It's about time we stopped letting the power elite walk all over us. People are starving and dying, for goodness sake. We should be helping each other worldwide to stop poverty and exclusion.
The worldwide economy is a shambles and it always hits the weakest and the most vulnerable the hardest.
Posted by: christine, lancashire 23 Apr 2008 17:34:44
I,d thought in this day and age they would have come up with better ideas how to run a car.
Like using H2O and solar power bring back the idea of the battery powered car built in the 80s by clive sinclair.
Where all going backwards in time and not foward just sums up this world.
Posted by: alec jackson 18 Apr 2008 09:40:14
Always knew that the whole save the planet issue was ridiculous.Unfortunately all parties have fallen for it by listening to the friends of the earth and aged hippy scientists who were probably stoned.Food comes first.Without it we die.Leave saving the planet to the hippy brigade.
Posted by: G.KING SUSSEX 15 Apr 2008 17:53:54
The mistake was that stupid poltitians listened to Friends of the Earth who havn't got a clue about the real world.
Posted by: Peter Fordham, Spain 15 Apr 2008 14:04:07
As the experts say,global warming is a natural phenomenon and there is nothing that we can do about it..we can reduce pollution for the health of the people and the planet,but thats just about as far as we can go.
The problem for us is that the 'Green Fundamentalist' were given too much rope,they got the Politicians involved,they saw votes for being 'Planet Friendly'and the whole 'Green' idea started to grow many heads,all with their own brains and their own agendas.
Even to utter what I have said in public can get you whipped by the 'Greenies',and the Politicians are so gutless that they withdraw funding from any scientist who does not toe the party line...its a real mess.
Posted by: Clive Cumbria 15 Apr 2008 09:48:32
Food prices wouldn't be an issue if money was given to technology for research.
Fuel from CO2.
Posted by: 4x4 driver 14 Apr 2008 18:05:09
Save the trees...for what, to put into cars. Stick to the knitting and keep looking for oil.
Posted by: Elizabeth Davies Cape Town 14 Apr 2008 14:41:15
The government has decreed bio fuel requirement in the UK will come from sustainable sources, and will by and large be grown by european farmers as grain. Dumping this grain surplus on the developing world has done nothing to solve Africa's problems over the years. If anything it has contributed to a dependancy culture. The agencies khalid refers to have done nothing for African self sufficiency. Infact have allowed leaders such as Mugabe to know they can destroy domestic agriculture safe in the knowledge that before the people go from hungry to starving the international agencies will show up with disaster releif and consolidate their position of power.
Posted by: graham 14 Apr 2008 14:06:31
Sir
Never did I dream I would see the day that the green lobby would oppose the introduction of such bio fuels, affirming the fact that there is life after all.
Now, how ridiculuos can the EU get by virtue of using wheat and rice, two of lifes essentials, and turn it into pocket linings, aka fuel.
Not only is such a proposition beyond belief but defies all sense of human logic.
The trimming of the rain forests alongside other such nonsense that we have become acustomed to, goes to show the fact that despite the famine and starvation witnessed in areas such as Africa, these monsters in power just turn a blind eye?
So, as I can't get my head round the EU sponsored state of starvation, will there be any one left living by the time green issues begin to ferment?
What the EU & the WHO, alongside the UN must do is ensure that the EU gets rid of its wheat mountain, *for food consumption only* the WHO ensure that 90% of fertile land worldwide is used only for food production and the UN to ensure the US doesnt starve the rest of the world, whilst the Middle East can further gain sawab points and reduce the damn price of oil so people can live.
In short, [No-Shakira]
Posted by: Khalid 14 Apr 2008 12:22:46