Food Prices to Stay High

  • Corn production in Colorado. (Photo by Scott Bauer, courtesy of the USDA Agricultural Research Service)

Food prices are expected to keep rising in the
coming year. That’s at least partly because farmers plan
to plant less corn. Dustin Dwyer reports:

Transcript

Food prices are expected to keep rising in the
coming year. That’s at least partly because farmers plan
to plant less corn. Dustin Dwyer reports:

Jim Hilker is an agricultural economist at Michigan State University. He says the
demand for corn is high right now.

“Ethanol’s probably the biggest driver of it, but there’s also been very strong corn
exports.”

Hilker says those exports are going to countries where the wheat crop has
come in lower than expected.

But with all the demand for corn, the U.S. Department of Agriculture says
farmers across the country are planning to plant about 8% less
corn this year, compared to last year. Last year farmers did plant more corn
than they had in more than 50 years. This year, corn production should still
be high, but it might not keep pace with demand.

Hilker says that could mean higher prices for food.

But he says there are a lot of other factors to consider when it comes to
food prices. He says gas is a big one, since food has to be transported.

For The Environment Report, I’m Dustin Dwyer.

Related Links

Cousteau Family in the Amazon

  • Jean-Michel Cousteau and school children from Iquitos at the Pilpintuwasi Butterfly Farm and Amazon Animal Orphanage, Pilpintuwasi. (Photo by Carrie Vonderhaar, Ocean Futures Society/KQED)

A TV documentary will soon bring the Amazon River
basin to living rooms across the nation. Lester Graham
reports the two-part series looks at how the Amazon
affects climate change for all of us:

Transcript

A TV documentary will soon bring the Amazon River
basin to living rooms across the nation. Lester Graham
reports the two-part series looks at how the Amazon
affects climate change for all of us:

The Amazon and its tributaries make up the largest river system in the world.

(Documentary narrator: “In spite of the enormous scale of this tropical rainforest basin, scientific evidence increasingly has revealed how fragile this ecosystem is. And how what happens here will influence global climate dramatically, possible irreversibly, within the next 10 to 20 years.”)

This two-part program produced by Jean-Michel Cousteau, “Return to the Amazon”,
shows that trees are the key to creating rain in the region and keeping the river alive.

Fifty-percent of moisture for rain in the Amazon is released directly from the trees.
So fewer trees means less rain.

(chainsaw noise)

20% of the Amazon rainforest has already been cut down.

And scientists predict if 30 to 40% of the Amazon forest is cut, it will pass a tipping
point, becoming too dry to survive, and no longer absorbing climate changing carbon
dioxide.

Jose Alvarez Alonso is with the Peruvian Amazon Research Institute. In the
documentary he says illegal logging not only endangers the forest, and the climate, but exploits the
indigenous people: paying them a small bag of sugar to illegally cut down an entire
mahogany tree, and in the process destroying their way of life.

“I can tell you that the mahogany taken out of the Amazon now is stained with
blood.”

Most of the logging is, at least, controversial. Much of it’s corrupt. And, often, it’s illegal. But Brazil still
exports massive amounts of wood.

That’s because people in the U.S. and Europe keep buying the rainforest wood.

In the 25 years since Jean Michel Cousteau last visited the Amazon with his father
Jacques Cousteau, he says there have been some disturbing changes and he
wanted people to see what’s going on. We asked Jean Michel Cousteau what he
hopes people get from the programs.

Cousteau: “Well, I really hope that it will be more than people just having had a good time, discovering a place maybe they didn’t know about, or have heard about but didn’t focus on some of the issues, and some of the solutions, and meet some of the local people. And that beyond all of that, they will take action. I really hope that people will be aware enough to understand the connections that they have, how much we depend upon places like the Amazon for the quality of our lives, every one of us.”

Graham: People who watch programs like yours, they look at these things, and they have one question: ‘Well, what can I do?’ What can an individual do when looking at a big problem like this?

Cousteau: Well, what you can do, there’s a lot you can do. As an individual, by being aware. How can you protect what you don’t understand? So, what we’re offering the public is answers to perhaps some of the questions or to highlight some of the problems. That allows you, as an individual decision maker, to make some better decisions when it comes to the wood you’re going to buy, the next time you look at a piece of furniture, you have the right to ask the question: ‘Is that coming from the rainforest?’

The two-part TV series does outline many of the problems. But, it also offers some
hope as researchers, environmentalists and governments in the Amazon basin work
to solve some of those problems.

For the Environment Report, I’m Lester Graham.

Related Links

Canada Losing Its Green Edge?

As leaders prepare for the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg, Canadian environmentalists say their country is no longer considered an important player on the world stage. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Karen Kelly reports:

Transcript

As leaders prepare for the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg, Canadian environmentalists say their country is no longer considered
an important player on the world stage. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s
Karen Kelly reports:


John Bennett remembers when Canada was one of the so-called “good guys.” He’s the director for climate change and energy with the Sierra Club of Canada.
And he says 14 years ago, Canadian leaders were among the first to call for action on global warming. Now, the Canadian government is seeking exemptions
from the Kyoto climate change agreement.


“The leadership it’s showing is how do you wheedle out of an important environmental agreement? How do you weaken the agreement to the point that it’s
meaningless in order to make it cheaper and easier for Canada to achieve the targets.”


Environmentalists at home and abroad say Canada has been slow to take serious action.
Canadian leaders have delayed signing the Kyoto Protocol. They argue that Canada should be able to make fewer reductions in pollution because it exports so-called
clean energy – like hydroelectric power – to the United States.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Karen Kelly.

Commentary – NAFTA Used to Sue Province

Late last month (October) Sun Belt Water of California filed a $10.5
billion suit against the Canadian government under the North American
Free Trade Agreement. The company claims that it has been mistreated
because the province of British Columbia banned the bulk exports of
water. As Great Lakes Radio Consortium commentator Suzanne Elston points
out, the outcome of the suit will probably cost us all a lot more than
money:

Appeals Made in Water Diversion Decision

A series of pre-hearing meetings have begun over an Ontario waterbottling company’s efforts to export Lake Superior water to Asia. TheGreat Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mike Simonson reports that the appeal isfacing an uphill battle:

Water Diversion Battle Continues

After being denied once, a Canadian company hoping to divert water fromthe Great Lakes and sell it to Asia is again seeking the permission ofthe Canadian Government. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s MikeSimonson reports the U.S. Congress may intervene: