Food prices nothing to do with biofuels, says Bush govt

Scientists do sometimes get it wrong, you know. If Greenbang has a pound for every time she’d found an error in Bunsen and Beaker’s calculations, well, she’d have a few more pounds than she does now. Bunch of muppets.

Anyway, the latest public body to take a pop at the conclusions of eminent scientists is the US Department of Agriculture. The department says anyone who reckons food prices are rising because of food-based biofuels is whacked off their proverbial whizzbits and there’s actually a lot of other reasons for the price hikes.

“High energy prices, increasing global demand, drought and other factors — not biofuels — are the primary drivers of higher food costs,” according to the department and it reckons that food price inflation was worse in the 70s and 80s. Take that, nostalgia!

It’s even prepared to show its workings out – Greenbang has attached it for your benefit.

Here’s more from the department on why biofuels are the shizzle:

U.S. Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer pointed to the fact that oil prices have broken through a series of price ceilings this year.

“Developing diversity in our portfolio of fuels is if anything an even more urgent matter than it has been in the past. And it is one that remains central to our energy security and our national security,” Schafer said. “The policy choices we have made on biofuels will deliver long-term benefits.”

Schafer pointed to International Energy Agency data that show global biofuels production has cut consumption of crude oil by 1 million barrels a day, offering savings of $120 million dollars a day.