Switch From Food To Fuel Crops Causing Global Food Price Crisis
According to officials at the World Bank, the price of staple crops has risen 80% in three years thanks to farmers being fuel producers instead of food producers.
What’s troubling is that it’s, by and large, the government that is driving this problem. Nations around the world are subsidizing biofuel production and mandating biofuel use, thus artificially increasing the demand (and thus the profitability) of fuel crops. This was certainly an unintended consequences, but it illustrates exactly why government shouldn’t try to control markets.
Regulate markets, sure. But not control them.
