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Grain: food or fuel? The next President may have to decide
By Lauren | April 25, 2008
This is the first in my series of Friday posts describing ethical dilemmas facing our nation and the next President. With Earth Day being celebrated this week, it seemed timely to start with an environmental issue that has serious ethical implications, not just for us but for future generations.
Thanks in part to Nobel Laureate Al Gore’s high-profile documentary, “An Inconvenient Truth,” almost everyone in the U.S. is well aware that the Earth is getting warmer, and that humanity’s extravagant use of fossil fuels has a whole lot to do with that. Many scientists argue that we’re at a tipping point: reduce our production of greenhouse gasses right now, or do lasting damage to the planet that is our home. The obvious solution would seem to be satisfying our growing hunger for energy by finding more eco-friendly fuel sources. “Eco-fuels,” gasoline substitutes made from grain, seem like an obvious choice.
Suddenly, however, with gas prices reaching record levels and eco-fuels looking better every day, there’s a world-wide shortage of the grains that keep hundreds of millions of people alive. As inconceivable as it may be to most well-fed Americans, much of the world’s population is scraping by on a dollar a day or less. When rice doubles in price in a few months, those folks don’t have a whole lot of choices. The head of the United Nations World Food Programme, Josette Sheeran, has called the rising cost of food a “silent tsunami” that is threatening the lives of millions of the poorest people around the world.
One of the reasons that grain is suddenly so expensive is that it’s the essential ingredient in eco-fuels, and we don’t yet have any other viable alternative available to meet our energy needs unless we go back to guzzling gasoline.
So, here’s the ethical dilemma: do we continue to produce eco-fuels to lower our gasoline consumption, knowing that in the process we may be dooming millions to starvation, or do we cut back on eco-fuel production so that the poorest among us can survive and, thereby, risk presenting our children and grand-children with a ruined planet? (Yes, I’m oversimplifying; this is a blog, not a doctoral thesis.) Should grain be food or fuel?
Would your Presidential candidate have the courage to take this issue on? If so, what would s/he do, and are you comfortable with that? You decide.
Topics: Presidential Campaign, Social Ethics, ethics |
April 27th, 2008 at 1:54 pm
I hope this isn’t a moral dilemma. As you stated, the choice is largely oversimplified. However, I don’t think the dilemma is to either feed the people or make grain ethanol. I think the issue is more feed people and find smarter solutions than grain ethanol. There are numerous problems in the current systems on both sides of this question. It should be that people of good will can move forward with solutions to both.
April 27th, 2008 at 11:19 pm
Hi Chris,
Thanks for writing, and I completely agree. The question isn’t whether we can solve this dilemma, but whether we will, and whether the next President will have the courage to take the issue on.
Lauren