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Opinions on biofuels mixed at World Food Prize events |
| Time:2008-7-5 15:40:00 From:Brownfield Network |
World Food Prize events are taking place throughout the week in Des Moines, including what's known as the Borlaug Dialogue, which this year, will focus on renewable fuels. And opinions here are mixed on using agricultural commodities to produce energy.
World Food Prize Ambassador Kenneth Quinn told Brownfield me there are legitimate concerns about using ag commodities for fuel, especially if those commodities can also be used to produce food. But Quinn pointed out that's not the only side of the issue.
"You can also imagine Africa - all that land that's marginal land - if you just could just have something you grew there that could be turned into fuel - could Africa be, you know, the new Saudi Arabia, and uplifting people there?" Quinn queried. "So there's great promise - there's great issues - and as Norman Borlaug would say, looking at the science, that's the way to get at this."
Corn-based ethanol got the unqualified endorsement of a Harvard professor in the form of retired Iowa Republican Congressman Jim Leach, who now directs the Institute of Politics at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government. Leach gave a foreign policy address Tuesday at the Iowa Hunger Summit. Afterwards, Leach told Brownfield he doesn't buy the arguments of those who say ethanol production takes corn away from food production and takes too much energy and water to produce. Leach emphasized that ethanol production also produces high-protein cattle feed in the form of dry distillers' grains.
"75% of corn goes to feed cattle, and so you really have a twofer circumstance," Leach said. "And that's one of the reasons when people do these analyses of the cost of ethanol, they always forget that there is a second product."
And on a day when crude oil hit a new record high, Leach said ethanol and other biofuels really do have the potential to play a role in limiting U.S. dependence on Middle Eastern oil and improving America's global strategic position. But that's not necessarily the view of this year's World Food Prize laureate.
Purdue University food scientist Dr. Philip Nelson, this year's World Food Prize winner, admitted he's no expert on ethanol or biodiesel. But Nelson told Brownfield he's leery of taking any commodity that can be used to produce food and turning it into fuel.
"If we divert it to biofuels, it's going to affect our food supply," Nelson predicted. "And I think we've already seen this in prices and so forth."
But at the same time, Nelson also suggested food supply isn't the primary challenge in feeding the world's hungry. Nelson, who won the World Food Prize for developing aseptic technology to keep bulk foods from spoiling without refrigeration, said he’s convinced advances in processing and logistics, not production, are more important in the fight against starvation.
"With production in many parts of the world now meeting, exceeding the need, we must bring in forms of preservation," Nelson said.
Meanwhile, Truth About Trade and Technology is hosted a forum Wednesday featuring biotech success story from large and small farmers from all across the globe. Thursday, Monsanto Chairman Hugh Grant and Acting U.S. Ag Secretary Chuck Conner will both address the World Food Prize symposium on biofuels. And Nelson will be honored in a ceremony at the Iowa state capitol Thursday night.
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