Biofuels in general and ethanol in particular were part of the discussion at the World Food Prize symposium in Des Moines this year. Despite the food versus fuel controversy that permeated the headlines for 2008, there seemed to be more acceptance of biofuels as being able to co-exist with food production and being part of the overall global agriculture picture.
This Ethanol Report podcast features some of the comments made at the World Food Prize events last week by UK Scientific Advisor Sir Gordon Conway, International Biofuels Commission co-chair Roberto Rodrigues, World Bank president Robert Zoellick, former senators George McGovern and Bob Dole – this year’s World Food Prize recipients, and Secretary of Agriculture Ed Schafer.
You can listen to “The Ethanol Report” on-line here:
Ethanol plants that have been hurt by dramatic fluctuations in commodity prices this year could be eligible for assistance from the US Department of Agriculture.
Secretary of Agriculture Ed Schafer told reporters after an address to the World Food Prize breakfast in Des Moines Friday that “some plants are under pressure because they’ve been speculating on corn.”
Schafer said there are USDA programs that could, for example, help the companies refinance and reduce their interest rates on operating expenses such as corn purchases. USDA’s Rural Development Program can lend up to $25 million to refinance or loan guarantees. “We have several ways we can help with dollars in rural areas,” Schafer said.
Some ethanol companies, most notably VeraSun, speculated on corn prices during the summer and locked in prices when corn was at $7 per bushel and now cash prices are about $3.50 per bushel, causing some significant losses. “There is going to have to be some credit applied to companies to buy some lower-priced corn to blend with their higher-priced corn obligations,” Schafer said.
If USDA allows the ethanol plants to participate in the loan programs, Schafer said there would be “no restrictions or litmus tests” on the size or ownership for companies to qualify.
The United Soybean Board has been actively building demand for biodiesel on behalf of soybean farmers since 1990 and the opportunities continue to grow on a global basis.
USB was one of the soybean industry sponsors of the World Food Prize luncheon in Des Moines this week which gave CEO John Becherer, pictured here with one of this year’s WFP winners former Senator Bob Dole, to talk about the role soybeans can play in both feeding and fueling the world.
“The reality is we do have an opportunity and we need to be producing more product so that we can feed more fish, more pork and more poultry,” Becherer said. Since soybeans are 20 percent oil and 80 percent protein, that allows producers to grow a crop that can provide both.
USB’s development of the biodiesel market has the potential also to pave the way for other feedstocks to be used to make biodiesel. “Developing biodiesel directly raised the farm gate value for soybeans and led to the commercialization of biodiesel,” Becherer said. “Other feedstocks such as animal fats were grandfathered in on the biodiesel research and commercialization which has led to expanding opportunities for other feedstocks for biodiesel.”
“I don’t see that stopping,” he continued. “I don’t think that soybean oil ever believed that we would be the be all, end all for producing soybean oil to be converted into biodiesel. As we move forward, I think the opportunities for other feedstocks to play a part in this process are great.”
He adds that alternatives like jatropha hold great promise for improving subsistence farmers in poorer countries.
Republican Senator Chuck Grassley of Iowa paid a visit to the World Food Prize breakfast on Friday morning to introduce the secretary of agriculture and make a few comments of his own about the importance of American agriculture in feeding the world, as well as honor his colleagues from the Senate, George McGovern and Bob Dole, who are this year’s World Food Prize recipients.
He believes that increasing the use and acceptance of biotech crops is vital. “We’re entering a new generation in agriculture,” Grassley said. “This generation not only encompasses feeding the world, but also fueling vehicles and eventually getting in to treating patients through pharmaceuticals in crops. This offers opportunities for biotechnology growth throughout the world that will continue to feed populations and provide new prospects for our rural communities.”
In a brief interview after the breakfast, Sen. Grassley said that biotechnology gives us an opportunity to have a stronger agriculture allowing for multiple uses of agricultural crops. “Things like the World Food Prize give an opportunity to educate people about biotechnology,” Grassley said. “By expanding agriculture you can provide food, fiber and fuel.”
Grassley said that the incentives for biodiesel included in the financial bailout passed by Congress are critical to development of the industry. “That’s how you get infant industries started,” he said. “The best proof of that is that we would not have an ethanol industry today were it not for the ethanol incentives.”
He got very passionate about the need for incentives in developing any alternative energy. He used the example of developing cellulosic ethanol. “People say we ought to have cellulosic so we’re not using grain, but how do they think we’d ever get a second generation of ethanol from cellulosic if we don’t have the first generation of ethanol, and we wouldn’t have the first generation if we didn’t have the tax incentives and the public policies to encourage an infant industry.”
Asked if he is concerned about Senator McCain’s comments about doing away with ethanol incentives, Grassley said, “Not as long as I’m in Congress. When he’s president of the United States, we’ll still be developing an ethanol industry.”
Listen to an interview with Grassley at the World Food Prize here:
The answer to feeding a growing world population lies with building on the success of the American farmer, according to Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer, who addressed the World Food Prize breakfast Friday morning in Des Moines.
“Our focus should be on sharing our technology, equipment and know-how, processes and procedures to help farmers all over the world boost the productivity of their land,” Schafer said. “Just in the last 15 years, our corn yields have increased from an average of 100 bushels per acre to 150 bushels per acre, a 50 percent increase in yield in 15 years.”
“Gains of this kind have allowed the United States producers to meet the rising demand for food and feed and fuel, while maintaining record level exports and strong food aid donations,” Schafer added.
Listen to Schafer’s address to the World Food Prize here:
Next to productivity, sustainability is the word being used most often at the World Food Prize symposium this week to talk about what is needed in global production of both food and biofuels.
The National Biodiesel Board formed a sustainability task force earlier this year, and one of the members of that task force is Victoria Carver with the Iowa Soybean Association. She says they are in the process of developing an advisory committee of experts and will be holding a symposium next month on the issue.
Carver attended many of the sessions at the World Food Prize symposium and was pleased with the overall emphasis on biotech crops, which can help increase production while not increasing land use. However, she did challenge a speaker during one session who said that biofuels were responsible were increasing food prices. “Food prices in real terms have come down dramatically in real terms, adjusted for inflation,” she said. “Do we really want to create a paradigm where farmers actually lose value in their product over time? And it’s especially important here at the World Food Prize because they are addressing issues of agriculture in developing countries which is a great economic opportunity there.”
In addition, Carver noted that biofuels have helped keep energy prices lower than they would be otherwise. “We know in this country that the increase in biofuels that’s been stimulated by the Renewable Fuels Standard has resulted in less of an increase in fuel prices than we would have had without it, by 40 cents a gallon,” she said. “I think it’s important that we think critically about the assumption that biofuels are kind of a culprit.”
The president of the World Bank made an appearance at the World Food Prize symposium Thursday on World Food Day and commented on world production of food and biofuels during a press conference.
Robert Zoellick noted that some biofuels are more efficient than others, like sugarcane ethanol in Brazil, and he believes that “biofuels in the future are going to be a critical component of a larger energy mix.” He also acknowledged the importance of creating the marketing framework which he says is “partly what some of the oilseeds-based and corn-based biofuels are about.”
He urges policy makers in the U.S. to consider some ways to change the structure of tariffs and subsidies for ethanol, such as having some “safety-valves” that would allow for the reduction of subsidies when prices reach certain levels.
The ability of the world to grow enough agricultural crops to produce both food and fuel was a topic of discussion at the World Food Prize symposium in Des Moines on Thursday, which was also World Food Day.
This year’s World Food Prize honorees, former Senators George McGovern and Bob Dole, pictured here with 2003 World Food Prize laureate Catherine Bertini, were asked what they thought about whether food and fuel production can co-exist.
“I think there is a moral challenge in utilizing food for fuel at a time when there’s so many hungry people in the world,” McGovern said. “On the other hand, if it’s kept within reasonable bounds, I think it can be good for both agriculture and nutrition.” He stressed the need for the development of non-food sources for fuel.
Dole noted the importance of new energy sources in the presidential election and he thinks the answer lies in having a number of alternatives. “There’s switchgrass and other biofuels, and there’s nuclear energy and drilling off-shore,” Dole said. “We gotta do everything we can, it’s not all going to be ethanol.”
During a World Food Prize luncheon sponsored by the soybean industry on Thursday, Hershey said that when you take the oil to use as a fuel, you’re still left with every bit of protein from the soybean. “By raising more soy for biodiesel, we actually raise more protein and that’s what the world needs,” Hershey said.
Hershey says they have calculated that of the 100 million gallons of soy biodiesel produced in Iowa last year, “the protein that came from those beans would feed 30 billion rations of soy” based on 25 grams per day.
Pioneer Hi-Bred International continues to work on increasing agricultural productivity to both feed and fuel the world.
Pioneer president Paul Schickler spoke on a panel at the World Food Prize symposium in Des Moines Wednesday and one of his points is that biotechnology can “address both the food availability issue as well as making a meaningful impact on our dependence on petroleum based products.”
“We can do that through a number of sciences in the market today and additional generations will be on the market in the years ahead,” Schickler said.
Schickler also took the first question to the panel, which was “How optimistic are you that the world can reduce hunger by half by 2015?”
Schickler stated that he was very confident that goal could be reached, simply on the basis of increased food production, using hybrid corn as an example. “If you look back throughout the development of hybrid corn, productivity has improved at about one and a half percent per year,” he said. “As we look to the future, we think we can double that, and that has already started to show up in the last 8-10 years through the use of biotechnology, plant genetics and improved agronomic practices.”
Listen to Schickler’s answer to that question here:
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Biofuels in general and ethanol in particular were part of the discussion at the World Food Prize symposium in Des Moines this year. Despite the food versus fuel controversy that permeated the headlines for 2008, there seemed to be more acceptance of biofuels as being able to co-exist with food production and being part of the overall global agriculture picture. 
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Ethanol plants that have been hurt by dramatic fluctuations in commodity prices this year could be eligible for assistance from the US Department of Agriculture.
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USB was one of the soybean industry sponsors of the 
He believes that increasing the use and acceptance of biotech crops is vital. “We’re entering a new generation in agriculture,” Grassley said. “This generation not only encompasses feeding the world, but also fueling vehicles and eventually getting in to treating patients through pharmaceuticals in crops. This offers opportunities for biotechnology growth throughout the world that will continue to feed populations and provide new prospects for our rural communities.”
The answer to feeding a growing world population lies with building on the success of the American farmer, according to Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer, who addressed the World Food Prize breakfast Friday morning in Des Moines.
The 
The president of the World Bank made an appearance at the 
The ability of the world to grow enough agricultural crops to produce both food and fuel was a topic of discussion at the World Food Prize symposium in Des Moines on Thursday, which was also World Food Day.
Making soybeans into biodiesel is no food versus fuel competition - rather it is food AND fuel.
Pioneer president Paul Schickler spoke on a panel at the World Food Prize symposium in Des Moines Wednesday and one of his points is that biotechnology can “address both the food availability issue as well as making a meaningful impact on our dependence on petroleum based products.”