Meat, dairy and other food producers assail ethanol
Congress about to decide whether to require sixfold hike in fuel output
Tucson, Arizona | Published: 09.16.2007
WASHINGTON — Already this year, ethanol has been blamed for more expensive Easter eggs, dying shrimp along the Louisiana coastline and costlier milk in school lunches.
Germans curse biofuels for higher beer costs. In Italy, consumer advocates organized a pasta boycott last week, complaining that pasta prices have soared because farmers grow crops for fuel, not food.
Minnesota bloggers even blamed the I-35 bridge collapse on ethanol, arguing that government money should have gone to bridge repair rather than ethanol subsidies.
Huge benefits pending
Now, with huge new benefits for ethanol pending in Congress, the corn growers and their ethanol allies are waging an offensive against detractors. And some of their biggest critics are other farm lobbyists. Meat, dairy, and other food producers are pushing back as higher grain prices cut into their already slim profit margins.
"The biofuels picture isn't perfect. There are certainly flaws in it, and the nation seems to be focusing on those flaws right now," said Rick Tolman, CEO of the National Corn Growers Association.
The twin messages that Tolman wants to convey in new videos and updated studies is that a grocery trip costs more now primarily because of higher energy prices and that farmers are doing a better job with chemicals and fertilizers.
Similarly, an alliance calling itself the Clean Fuels Development Coalition last week distributed a new Ethanol Fact Book arguing that "we can have both food and fuel, and more of both, thanks to ethanol production."
"For years we were criticized for having cheap corn that was encouraging obesity," Tom Buis, president of the National Farmers Union, said at a news conference.
"And then this last year when corn got to $4 (per bushel), it switched to 'You're causing people to starve around the world.' "
Congress is about to decide whether to give fast-growing biofuels a new supercharger by requiring that the nation use 36 billion gallons yearly by 2022 — 15 billion gallons from corn.
That is six times what is used today. Next in the schedule: The Senate and the House appoint members to decide whether the Senate-passed, 36 billion-gallon mandate survives.
The opponents of higher ethanol production are powerful, too. Tyson Foods Inc., the nation's largest meat company, said grain costs for its chicken feed shot up $113 million in the third quarter of this year alone compared with the year before.
The American Meat Institute has taken heed. Spokeswoman Janet Riley said the group is "absolutely" opposed to more ethanol mandates and will continue to lobby against them.
The meat group has joined dairy, egg and turkey lobbyists to fight any increase in ethanol mandates that could divert yet more feed into fuel refineries.
The coalition launched a Web site recently called "Balanced Food and Fuel."
The home page is filled with stories and editorials culled from media outlets around the county, spelling out the seemingly dire consequences of growing demand for biofuel.
Headlines on the site warn of a "spiral of rising prices" as "corn prices skyrocket." One story outlines an ominous increase in pizza prices.
Another corn critic is the Environmental Working Group, which along with allies mined government records to find that nearly 2 billion tons of soil gets eroded each year — and with it nitrate pollution choking rivers and streams on the way to creating a vast swath of "dead zone" in the Gulf of Mexico.
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The problem will only worsen with more corn planted for ethanol, the group contends, so Washington needs to enforce existing rules requiring conservation in return for crop subsidies.
This weekend in Washington, dozens of experts from 16 countries planned a strategy session and "teach-in" a la the 1960s carrying a message that agro-fuels is a dangerous diversion from the fight against global warming.
One participant, University of California engineering professor Tadeusz Patzek, argued Friday that energy savings from ethanol won't be sufficient to prepare for dramatic oil and carbon reductions forced on the United States in coming years.
The St. Louis Post-Dispatch and The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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