Do you ‘live to eat’ or ‘eat to live?’ Either way rising food prices are surely going to affect your Bon Appetite. Rising global population, greater demand from the developing world, unprecedented climatic conditions, an artificially created food crisis through trade barriers and subsidies, food grains used for biofuels are all fueling the hike in food prices.

Rise in the price of essential food items like wheat, corn, is likely to further widen the gap of inequalities and bring along a tide of social unrest.

Has the green revolution backfired?

In most developed countries, governments have used subsidies to keep food prices artificially low. As a result, production-linked subsidies encouraged higher yields, which flooded the markets and caused prices to fall. To earn more, farmers aimed for even higher yields, even as more lands was cleared for agriculture- a vicious cycle that did nothing for incomes and did much to destroy the environmental landscapes and quality of farmland. These poor farming practices and deforestation will be exacerbated by climate change to slowly degrade soil fertility, leaving vast areas unsuitable for crops or grazing. As it is most arable land is being lost to climate change, urban development and bio-fuels.

Modern day industrial agriculture has become more and more dependent on petroleum and its byproducts.Mechanized energy put into the process has also increased at a greater rate, so that the ratio of crops produced to energy input has decreased over time. Green Revolution techniques also heavily rely on chemical fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides. Therefore, with the rise in oil prices growing food is getting all the more expensive.

The governments need to recover the money squandered on subsidies, to level the same they find another use for the seeming flood of food grains in the agro fuels market instead of passing then on to starving people of the world. On the other hand world population are predicted to be 50% higher by 2050 and the planet will need more food!

Food or fuel?

The scale of the change in the pursuit of future energy is mind boggling. The White House is leading the push for an increase in ethanol production through tax subsidies. In George Bush’s drive for energy security, 20% of the US corn crop is already going into bio-ethanol. That is 20% no longer available for human or animal feeds. Europe, too, wants 5.75% of its consumption to be met from bio-fuels by 2010.

While this may be marginally better for carbon emissions and energy security, it is proving horrendous for food prices and anyone who stands in the way of unchecked new industry.

Where lie the answers?

While some are keen on the debatable, issue of nuclear power other feel that genetically modified crops with all their controversies will be the only means to feed the populace of the future. Do you think we should all turn vegetarian so that the huge amount of grain used as livestock feed, could go to feed many hungry people? Is laboratory grown food, or food tablets the answer? Should we look for arable land on other planets? Alternatively, wait silently as the inflationary impact of biofuels on global food prices imposes starvation on millions of people.

Image credit: [1], [2]