A weird title, disjointed and unclear.

But so is the real world situation of government and NGO behaviour regarding energy utilization and planning, fossil fuel dependence and exploitation, CO2 and carbon controls and trading, globalization and world domination agendas and endless debates on all these, and thus we arrive at a small but important aspect – corn production and ethanol useage.

USDA 98c0442 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I might sum up the aforesaid debating as, not so much weird, disjointed and unclear, but perhaps confusing (or confused), a variety of topics and opinions and a wealth of genuine information and logic. Occasionally, a reader will offer some insight into a debate that raises my awareness and understanding and stands out as a ‘gem’.

Borrowing from WUWT‘s post ” Dispelling myths about global warming “, itself (the post and the blog in general), one of the many ‘gems’ from which we learn so much, I take the liberty of reproducing part of the ‘reader’s commentary’:

1. A. Scott says:

   March 26, 2013 at 6:27 pm

   richard verney says: March 26, 2013 at 4:05 am

   One important factor not addressed by you, is surplus quantity. How much grain does the US export (say over the past 30 years), and much grain is exported in it food aid programme (say over the past 30 years)? A sub issue is the use of GM crops to try and make good the shortage of conventional crops which shortage has been caused by the switch in land use to biofuels.

   I have addressed this question regularly. Anyone can go to the US Field Grain Yearbook (or the extensive other data the USDA provides) and find out the true facts instead of repeating partisan rhetoric.

   As to corn – contrary to the claims that ethanol production has reduced or negatively affected corn exports:

   *Total US Corn exports averaged 47 million metric tons a year fro period 1991-2011. The average US corn exports for the peak ethanol increase years of 2002 – 2007 was 51 million metric tons with a top number of 6o.7 million metric tons in 2007/08.

   *During the period since corn use began increasing due to ethanol – 2002 thru 2011 – US corn use for fuel increased from 997 to to 5,018 million bushels. Yet the US exports increased significantly during the height of that period.

   *Prices both increased AND decreased significantly from 2002-2011, despite corn used for ethanol growing substantially.

   *The US has met ALL domestic use, both food and fuel, met ALL export demand, AND has still maintained an average annual surplus of 1.4 billion bushels during the period 1991-2011

   The price of US corn/grains is only one factor and the issue is not whether (due to efficiencies) the US can produce grain at a cheaper price than some foreign country can do so through its own domestic production. Some suggest that the increase in grain price was one factor behind the Arab Spring which, in itself, has led to thousands of deaths. So political commentators consider that there has been an increase in the price of export grains

   More unsupported allegations. The US has provided, during the 1991-2011 period, up to 92% of Egypt’s corn imports – on average over 71% each year during this entire period.

   The truth is in the data. While US corn exports declined slightly from 2008 – from an almost exactly average year of 47,900 million metric tons to appx 39,000 million metric tons in 2011, its is becasue the other corn exporting country’s – Argentina, Brazil, India and the EU combined, increased their corn exports from 16,900 to 52,200 million metric tons from 2005 to 2011. Their cheaper corn has reduced the overall export demand in the US.

   And what about your claims about prices? Again the data tells the truth.

   *1971-1991 Corn prices averaged $2.28 a bushel, with prices mostly between $2.50 and $3.20 for that period.

   *1991-2011 Corn prices averaged $2.57 a bushel, with prices mostly between $1.85 and $3.04 for that period.

   *2001-2011 Corn prices averaged $3.37 a bushel, with prices mostly between $1.97 and $3.55 for that period.

   There are short, speculator driven spikes during each of these periods, as with today. But the reality is, absent those short spikes, Corn prices today are very little changed than they were in the 1970′s

   Regardless – lets take the 1971-1991 average of $2.28 a bushel and compare to the 2011 price of $5.18. That would be a 127% increase from 1971 to 2011, a 40 year period. That would be an average annual increase of just over 3%.

   From 2001 to 2011 the US supplied 0.566 billion metric tons of corn exports comprising 52% of ALL world corn exports.Most of that corn was supplied at the same prices as corn sold for in the 1970′s.

   Anyone that claims the US has not done, and is not doing, greatly more than their fair share, regardless of whether it is about export quantity or price, is simply not living in the real world, or has an agenda to push.

   Once again – the US is providing for ALL domestic demand, including ethanol, is providing for ALL export demand, and sill maintains an appx 1 to 2 billion bushel domestic reserve.

   We also effectively maintain an appx 5 billion bushel further domestic reserve thru the ethanol industry, which the ethanol industry demonstrated in 2012. With low crop yields and substantial losses related to the drought, and production well below projected, the US ethanol industry reduced corn their usage in 2012 by almost the entire amount below projections.

   Egypt has huge oil reserves and revenue. It is not our responsibility to provide this rich nation cheap, subsidized food. We already provide the majority of their corn import demand and have for many years. And we do so at fair, market prices. It is Egypt’s responsibility to provide for their people – and they have plenty of money to do so should the ruling elite so choose.

2. A. Scott says:

   March 26, 2013 at 7:07 pm

   One more for Richard Verney. From Rami Zurayk, professor of agricultural and food sciences at the American University of Beirut and author of Food, Farming and Freedom: Sowing the Arab Spring. He addresses pretty much exactly what I said:

   Already, in Egypt and Yemen, more than 40% of the population live below the poverty line and suffer from some form of malnutrition. Most of the poor in these countries have no access to social safety nets.

   “Bread riots” have been occurring regularly since the mid 1980s, following policies brought to us by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. Among these were the reduction of agricultural subsidies and the encouragement of production of fruits and vegetables for export, at the expense of investing in local grain production. Export of value-added produce and the import of basic commodities such as wheat were monopolised by a small group of “entrepreneurs” protected by the security state who financially backed the ruling elite…. The US gave Egypt around $1.7bn last year, exceeded only by the $2.4bn it gave to Israel.

   Not only are we providing the majority of their corn (and other) imports, we are sending huge sums of other aid.

   Again – the “State” and the ruling elite have vast sums of oil money at their control, yet seemingly refuse to use it.

   SO, I believe that there is much understanding to be gained here. “About many things”, misconceptions of CO2 “dangers”, corn production and ethanol useage, through to   financial controllers and world politics.

   Appropriate acknowledgements to WUWT and “A. Scott”, source linked here.

Related articles

• Corn Supply Slumps Most Since ’75 on Ethanol Profit: Commodities – Bloomberg (bloomberg.com)
• U.S. Corn Reserves Seen Jumping to 26-Year High on Record Crop – Bloomberg (bloomberg.com)
• The Keys to Defeating the NWO (philosophers-stone.co.uk)
• Ethanol: Food vs. Fuel (parishgov.wordpress.com)