Food Before Fuel Campaign Launches, Aims to Encourage Congress to Reconsider Food-To- Fuel Policies

Date Posted: Jun. 10, 2008

WASHINGTON—June 10, the Food Before Fuel Campaign - a partnership of more than 20 environmental, retail, hunger, Hispanic and food industry groups - launched a cooperative effort urging Congress to revisit the nation's food-to-fuel policies, a key factor in the growing global food crisis.

Congressional policies mandate the conversion of more than one-third of all U.S. corn to ethanol, with additional subsidies and tariffs further promoting the diversion of food to fuel. Food policy experts broadly agree that these policies have contributed to record food price inflation, and the International Monetary Fund reports that U.S. food-to-fuel policy is responsible for more than 30 percent of food price inflation globally.

According to the Campaign's statement of principles, the members will encourage policymakers to "revisit and restructure policies that have increased our reliance on food as an energy source, and to carefully address how to develop alternative fuels that do not pit our energy needs against affordable food and environmental sustainability."

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