Profession Runge and Senaeur are concerned about the implications of this ‘biofuels craze’ on food security. They have written that the ethanol industry is causing a sharp upward spike in the prices of staple food (corn, wheat, rice). This is happening in the US because of the enormous demand for corn by the ethanol producers; the shift in tilled acreage towards corn and away from other crops and the play of the ubiquitous hedge fund speculator. Elsewhere prices are rising because of inter-linkages. The price of Mexican tortilla flour has for instance doubled in 2006 because Mexico imports 80 per cent of its corn requirements from the US and the price of a bushel of imported US corn has increased from $ 2.80 to $ 4.20. The professors cite a study carried out by the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI). The institute projects that on the assumption that the present trend will continue, the rising demand for biofuels will increase global corn prices by 20 per cent by 2010; oil seeds (including soyabeans, rapeseed, and sunflower) by 26 per cent, wheat by 11 per cent and cassava by 33 per cent. The professors state that this will undermine the UN’s Millennium Development goal to halve the proportion of the ‘chronically underfed’ from 16 per cent in 1990 to 8 per cent by 2015. This is because their research has shown that for every one per cent increase in the price of staple foods, the number of ‘food insecure’ people increases by 16 million. The professors also caution against using the ‘green’ peg to promote biofuels. In their view (and to support this view they provide statistics on the net energy balance, that is, the ratio between the energy produced and the energy required to produce) the environmental benefits of biofuels are limited at best.

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