Quote:
Originally Posted by knowitman
While it is a different type of corn grown for ethanol production, it is taking up land that could be used for production of corn for human or livestock consumption which all eventually makes it way to the food supply.
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Taking up land? Where? Currently the U.S. government pays to keep 32 million acres per year fallow. That is fifty thousand square miles for those doing the math. Prior to 2005 we were paying to keep 40 million acres per year fallow, that number was only limited after 2005 because of budgets cuts. To put that into perspective, prior to 2005 only 20 states were larger than the amount of land the United States was paying people not to grow food on every year. That doesn't include the huge swaths of land that aren't being compensated for being fallow which far exceed the numbers above.
There is no shortage here, rather there is a literally enormous excess in terms of production possibilities. If you're paying more for food it isn't because we are running out of land to grow that food on.