Two global crises are jousting for supremacy. The New York Sun reported today that the global climate change crisis, ushered into prominence by former vice president Al Gore, may risk being moved to second place on the list of World’s Biggest Problems, behind the global food crisis. Soaring prices for rice, wheat, and grain, notes the Sun’s Josh Gerstein, have already led to civil unrest in as Haiti, Indonesia, and Afghanistan, and are threatening to do the same in other susceptible countries around the world. Because 30 percent of America’s corn crop, and plenty of sugarcane, is now being used to produce ethanol, rather than food products, some are blaming biofuel subsidies for the problematic price hikes. But biofuel advocates are fighting back. They maintain that escalating oil prices, higher demand from emerging markets, and strange weather patterns, rather than the rise of biofuel as the alternative energy du jour, are to blame for the current food shortages. Though Al Gore has tried to elevate himself above the fray, he did express qualified support for corn-based ethanol in an interview with Popular Mechanics last year.
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