Committee on Food Security stresses right to food in biofuels debate

Biofuels Digest
Meghan Sapp | October 14, 2013

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How to Survive as a Biofuel Maker: Sell Algae to Bakers

Scientific American

 By David Biello

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Can a Food for Cows Make Healthier Snickerdoodles?

The Wall Street Journal
By LIAM PLEVEN

BROOKINGS, S.D.—Padu Krishnan thinks he has a recipe to help Americans eat healthier. He has been cooking up treats using a special ingredient he says can make baked goods more filling and nutritious.

Padu Krishnan, a food scientist at South Dakota State University, tests recipes in a lab.

."I'm about changing people's food habits," says the 57-year-old professor at South Dakota State University. "There's no reason why it shouldn't take off."

One hurdle: His superfood of the future is the stuff left over from turning corn into fuel ethanol.

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Researchers say $100B needed for plant science R&D to meet food, fuel targets

Biofuels Digest
Jim Lane
June 22, 2012

In Washington, writing in The Scientist, Carnegie Institution of Washington’s Wolf Frommer and Tom Brutnell of the Donald Danforth Plant Science Center said that a 10-year, $100 billion investment in food and energy science is required, in order to address the planet’s long term fuel and food needs.

The authors note a 2012 FAO estimate that 920 million people lack sufficient food to meet suggested daily caloric intake goals, and that global food production must increase 70 percent by 2050 to meet basic needs. The authors said that research in plant sciences, which has been shrinking, must be increased in the areas of crop yield, plant pathogens, water and fertilizer use — as well as the develop of plants that can produce sustainable biofuels.

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Africa: New Tools Help Countries Harness the Potential of Bioenergy, Avoid Pitfalls

AllAfrica.com
5 March 2012

Rome — FAO has just released a suite of guidance documents and policymaking tools that governments can use to help rural communities benefit from bioenergy development and ensure that biofuel crop production does not come at the expense of food security.

Materials released today by FAO's Bioenergy and Food Security Criteria and Indicators (BEFSCI) Project include: methodologies for assessing the environmental and socioeconomic impacts of bioenergy production, indicators that can be measured when doing so, recommended good practices, and policy measures for promoting sustainable bionenergy development.

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FAO Says Agriculture Key to Addressing Future Water and Energy Needs

Biofuels Journal
Date Posted: November 18, 2011

Rome/Bonn—As pressure on the world's water resources reaches unsustainable levels in an increasing number of regions, a "business-as-usual" approach to economic development and natural resource management will no longer be possible, FAO said Nov. 17.

Agriculture will be key to the implementation of sustainable water management, the Organization told attendees at an international meeting on water, energy and food security being held in Bonn.

Speaking on the sidelines at the Bonn 2011 Nexus Conference, FAO Assistant Director-General for Natural Resources, Alexander Mueller, said: "Tackling the challenges of food security, economic development and energy security in a context of ongoing population growth will require a renewed and re-imagined focus on agricultural development.

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Ethanol Co-products Boost Nutrition in Asian Flatbread

Innovations Report (Germany)
07.06.2010

South Dakota State University research shows a traditional Asian flatbread called chapathi, or chapati, gets a big boost in protein and fiber when fortified with food-grade distillers grains.

SDSU food scientist Padu Krishnan said it is one example of the ways in which distillers dried grains with solubles, or DDGS, can help improve human nutrition worldwide. DDGS is produced as a co-product when processing corn into ethanol, so corn producers from the American Midwest and elsewhere could tap a vast new market if manufacturers begin using it to fortify products in human diets.

Krishnan and his student, Sowmya Arra, worked with Kurt Rosentrater of the USDA Agricultural Research Service’s North Central Agricultural Research Laboratory on the project. In lab studies they found that using DDGS to make up 10 percent of the dough in chapathi, an Asian whole wheat unleavened bread eaten in South Asia and East Africa, boosted the fiber from 2.9 percent to 7.8 percent. Using 20 percent DDGS in the dough increased the fiber to 10.3 percent.

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Food vs. fuel: MSU scientists say growing grain for food is more energy efficient

EurekaAlert!
Public release date: 19-Apr-2010
Michigan State University

EAST LANSING, Mich. — Using productive farmland to grow crops for food instead of fuel is more energy efficient, Michigan State University scientists concluded, after analyzing 17 years' worth of data to help settle the food versus fuel debate.

"It's 36 percent more efficient to grow grain for food than for fuel," said Ilya Gelfand, an MSU postdoctoral researcher and lead author of the study. "The ideal is to grow corn for food, then leave half the leftover stalks and leaves on the field for soil conservation and produce cellulosic ethanol with the other half."

Other studies have looked at energy efficiencies for crops over shorter time periods, but this MSU study is the first to consider energy balances of an entire cropping system over many years. The results are published in the April 19 online issue of the journal Environmental Science & Technology.

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FlameDisk Introduces Solid Ethanol Charcoal Alternative

Biofuels Journal
Date Posted: April 6, 2010

Madison, WI—Thousands of grilling enthusiasts now have more free time following the invention of the FlameDisk, a revolutionary alternative to charcoal.

This convenient grilling option, which employs solid ethanol as its fuel source, lights instantaneously with the touch of a match and is ready to cook on in less than one minute, eliminating the time needed to arrange and light coals.

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On Campus: UW-Oshkosh to power campus by turning food into fuel

The State Journal (Madison, WI)
By DEBORAH ZIFF dziff@madison.com 608-252-6234
Posted: Wednesday, February 24, 2010 2:06 pm

On the UW-Oshkosh campus, cafeteria leftovers could soon be used to power the college's heat and electricity.

The university says its planned dry fermentation anaerobic biodigester will be the first of its kind in the nation, converting campus and community yard and food waste into fuel.

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Rethinking the Value of Corn Ethanol Co-Products in Lifecycle Assessments

An Ethanol Across America White Paper
Summer 2009

Producing More Food and Fuel with Less Carbon

In the long and successful history of first-generation ethanol (i.e. ethanol from starch) —and despite the significant energy, economic and environmental benefits it has provided —the
critics remain.

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Madrid High-level Meeting on Food Security for All Calls for Exploring Options for a Global Partnership for Agriculture and Food Security

Climate-L.org

27 January 2009: The High-level Meeting on Food Security for All, held from 26-27 January 2009, in Madrid, Spain, issued a statement that calls for a consultative process on options for a Global Partnership for Agriculture Food Security and Nutrition. Convened by the Government of Spain and the UN, and attended by representatives of 126 countries as well as UN agencies, civil society, trade unions, academia, donor agencies and the private sector, the meeting reviewed progress in addressing the global food crisis since the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) High-level Conference on World Food Security: the Challenges of Climate Change and Bioenergy, held in June 2008.

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Firm to unveil process to allow ethanol plants to add food

KMEG TV (Nebraska)
Associated Press - June 15, 2008 1:35 PM ET

COLWICH, Kan. (AP) - The nation's leading designer of ethanol plants plans to unveil a new technology that would allow processors of corn-based ethanol to produce food for human consumption as well as fuel.

Tomorrow, ICM Incorporated will introduce its advanced food and fuel technology -- a "dry corn fractionation" process that allows the use of the entire corn kernel. The plan calls for the construction of separate facilities at ethanol plants where the dry corn kernel can be separated into its components before it is contaminated in the later ethanol distillation process.

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