Corn Ethanol and Rising Food Prices

Room for Debate features a discussion of food price increases (via the Dish).  There are several articles there.  From Kay McDonald:

The corn ethanol policy is a driver of high food prices worldwide. More than 15 percent of global corn production and a total of 35 million acres are devoted to U.S. ethanol. The U.S. is the largest exporter of corn, but we use twice as much corn to produce ethanol as we use it for food export.
Wheat and soy prices increase when corn prices are high, since their acreage allotment is replaced by corn. In addition, wheat and soy get substituted for corn as animal feed.
High corn prices cause higher meat, dairy, wheat and soy prices for consumers. Since last June, the corn price has doubled. Soy and wheat prices are each up 60 percent. Cattle and hog prices have risen 25 percent.

Kenneth Cassman cites supply and demand issues:

Three trends are responsible, and they have flown under the radar.
First, the speed of economic development in the world’s most populous countries has been faster than expected, resulting in higher incomes and greater per capita food consumption.
Second, crop yield gains have slowed, and grain yields have stagnated for a large portion of global grain supply. Examples include rice in Korea, Japan and China; wheat in India and much of Europe; and maize in China. Although conversion of new land to crop production can offset this slowdown, most spare land suitable for agriculture resides under rain forests, wetlands and grassland savannah. Conversion of these carbon-rich and bio-diverse ecosystems should be avoided because it would accelerate greenhouse gas emissions and increase extinctions.
Third, there has been a substantial decrease in funding of research to enhance yields by methods other than biotechnology.

I don't think ethanol makes that good of a fuel, but I like to drink me some.