2 - do you know someone (person, institution) who has studied deeply the effect on the increase of oil price in external acquisition of food? if it takes more than a few seconds to remember and write back, I'm not sure if you should answer. I don't want to burden you.
Some of that may be exchange-based due to the declining dollar, but these items come from Central to far-South America, and I don't know if they are still somewhat aligned or not. paul spencer
Here's another (ugly, sorry) graph showing what US corn is used for:
Ethanol transformation makes up most of the industrial uses, others being cornstarch, corn oil, polymers, etc. The main use is still for animal feed (and the very mysterious residual, which I'm the only person in the world to understand, and I'm not saying.)
From the same page:
U.S. Grains Council | Barley, Corn & Sorghum | Corn
The United States grew 42 percent of the world's corn in during fiscal year 2006, producing 282.3 million metric tons (11.1 billion bushels). Other major corn producing countries in 2006 included: China -139.4 million metric tons (5.5 billion bushels) Brazil - 41.7 million metric tons (1.64 billion bushels) European Union - 48.3 million metric tons (1.9 billion bushels) Mexico - 19.5 million metric tons (767 million bushels) Argentina - 15.8 million metric tons (622 million bushels) India - 15 million metric tons (590.5 million bushels)
The United States grew 42 percent of the world's corn in during fiscal year 2006, producing 282.3 million metric tons (11.1 billion bushels). Other major corn producing countries in 2006 included:
Your point about prices: yes, these are futures markets, and there's a certain amount of speculation taking place. But world demand is exceeding supply, even if the US is keeping up its export level. (China, for example, had to import grains this year in spite of its food self-sufficiency doctrine, because ethanol distilleries were buying up local production).
