On 7/21/2011 6:32 AM, HeyBub wrote:
....

It was my understanding that, before the ethanol cultists took over the U.S.
government, we exported corn to Mexico. Now, corn growers turn their corn
into fuel, much to the despair of Mexicans.
....

That's what the consortium of the food manufacturers and processors
would like you to think; they're spending millions in a campaign to
demonize ethanol as the convenient whipping boy to justify higher
consumer costs.

From a USDA brief...

....The United States experienced record demand and corn production
during 2007/08 that pushed U.S corn exports to 61 million metric tons.
However, a slowing world economy and reduced demand for corn are
projected to dampen corn exports in the near future. Nonetheless, global
population increases and consumer demand for meat products will continue
to support expanding feed grain exports in the long term.

World Corn Trade

While the United States dominates world corn trade, exports account for
only a relatively small portion of demand for U.S. corn—about 15
percent. ...

From a (somewhat) surprising source; an Indian analysis...

That last argument is in line with statements of leading UN
representatives, ... that fuel policies pursued by the US and the EU
were one of the main causes of the current worldwide food crisis.

There are various arguments thrown into the current discussion about
rising food prices. Food prices are the result of a complex scenario
on a global scale. To claim monocausal reasons to be responsible for
the food price rise like the rising production of biofuels and
ethanol seems misleading. Probably, a whole package of various
factors can be identified as causing higher food prices, one of them
being the higher oil price. The oil price directly affects farm
operation costs, input costs, and transport costs of produce, then
distribution and retailing costs. All that adds up. Other factors
being a change in diets. FAO itself admits in studies that a
Westernization of diets takes place in Asian economies.

That the production of ethanol cannot be the main reason for the
price rise one can easily make out from the fact that one of the
highest price rises of about 200% was seen with rice, a cereal not
known to be usedfor ethanol production so far.

As for the Mexican imports, they've gone up as well, significantly.
However, as another noted, all corn for ethanol production is yellow
field corn, not white or sweet corn for (direct) human consumption.

It's a complex, global economic system now and the interplay between
competing governments various policies are certainly factors but there's
far more going on that simply US ethanol. The rise of the EU and their
protective and restrictive policies combined w/ the demise of the former
Soviet Union has markedly changed the European marketplace. Brazil and
Argentina being in the southern hemisphere can play the US weather
patterns and target export markets specifically for those years when
prices are high owing to poor weather in the US (and, to a far lesser
degree, the US can try to anticipate in the other direction).

China has become a wild card; they oscillate between a large importer to
a significant exporter depending on current conditions there and the
whims of their central government regarding trade and subsidies.

It's all tied together...

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