Free Republic

One of the striking features of modern politics is the speed at which a candidate, or a cause, can topple from the pedestal to the doghouse. Just a few years ago the emergence of biofuels was considered so important to our country's drive for energy independence that Congress voted a fifty-one-cent-per-gallon subsidy for ethanol to help get this fledgling industry on its feet. Now ethanol and other biofuels are being blamed for everything from global warming, to increased pollution, to the sharp rise in food prices that have triggered riots in parts of Asia and Africa. My colleagues here at...

NEW DELHI: Instead of blaming India and other developing nations for the rise in food prices, Americans should rethink their energy policy and go on a diet, say a growing number of politicians, economists and academics here. Criticism of the United States has ballooned in India recently, particularly after the Bush administration seemed to blame India's increasing middle class and prosperity for rising food prices. Critics from India seem to be asking one underlying question: "Why do Americans think they deserve to eat more than Indians?" The food problem has "clearly" been created by Americans, who are eating 50 percent...

In an article appearing in the Los Angeles Times, actor Martin Sheen was quoted in a letter he wrote to the Malibu Times about the use of fluoride by the Metropolitan Water District. "We are not lab rats and reject any attempt to be treated as such," he penned. Huh? Where do these people come from? Isn’t the prevention of tooth decay high on the to-do list of environmental worshipers? At what point will these people just leave the rest of us alone? In the interest of full disclosure, I twice briefly met Mr. Sheen years ago and found him...

t's low in fat, low in food miles and completely free range. In fact, some claim that Sciurus carolinensis - the grey squirrel - is about as ethical a dish as it is possible to serve on a dinner plate. The grey squirrel, the American cousin of Britain's endangered red variety, is flying off the shelves faster than hunters can shoot them, with game butchers struggling to keep up with demand. 'We put it on the shelf and it sells. It can be a dozen squirrels a day - and they all go,' said David Simpson, the director of Kingsley...

Everyone’s heard these medical myths, and your mom (and maybe even your doctor!) may have been guilty of spreading a few of them: High blood pressure causes headaches. High blood pressure usually has no symptoms. Neither does it cause dizziness, although dizziness is a common side effect of treatments for high blood pressure. Women should examine their breasts. Research shows that routine breast self-examinations aren’t sensitive enough to detect many lumps, and may subject women to increased anxiety. It’s dangerous to mix alcohol and antibiotics. Alcohol doesn’t interact with antibiotics. Metronidazole (Flagyl) is an exception, however, and can cause vomiting....

China looks abroad to grow its own food By Richard Spencer Last Updated: 2:31AM BST 10/05/2008 Chinese farming companies may be backed by the government to buy and lease tracts of land in Africa and Latin America to grow crops to feed its 1.3 billion people. A proposal before the state council, or cabinet, proposes extending a business strategy known as the "go-out policy" to farmland. As food prices rise, the Chinese government is anxious about food security, though it may not be willing to risk the accusation of colonialism that such a move would attract. The country has long...

Cyclone survivors may have to grow their own food 18:15 09 May 2008 Debora MacKenzie The UN Food and Agriculture Organisation is calling for $10 million in emergency farming equipment and seeds for parts of southern Burma devastated by Cyclone Nargis, to help plant the next rice crop. Meanwhile the UN's World Food Programme has stopped emergency food shipments to the disaster zone after the country's military dictators impounded the first shipment on arrival. Cyclone Nargis, which hit southern Burma last Saturday, devastated the delta of the Irawaddy River, the country's main rice growing region. Up to 100,000 may have...

Eat like a caveman for a healthy heart By Kate Devlin, Medical Correspondent Last Updated: 8:28PM BST 08/05/2008 A “caveman diet” of berries, nuts, lean meat and fish could help reduce the risk of developing heart disease, a new study shows. Scientists found that volunteers who ate the stone age fare for just three weeks had lowered blood pressure and a reduced risk of clots. They also lost an average of five pounds in weight.Meat, as long as it is lean, is beneficial Our early ancestors lived on a diet lacking in cereals, dairy products and refined sugar for centuries...

In a region beset by runaway food costs, the socialist government of Hugo Chávez's Venezuela and its leftist allies appear to have found fertile ground to plant the seeds of revolutionary discourse. At an emergency food-security summit held Wednesday in Managua, Nicaragua, 14 Latin American and Caribbean nations convened under the umbrella of the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA), the leftist trade bloc founded in 2004 by Cuba and Venezuela as an alternative to United States free-trade agreements. The summit was supposed to focus on how the countries can prevent food shortages and unrest as the global food crisis...

Indispensable in hot kitchens: the nanotube Oxford chemists have found a way of using carbon nanotubes to judge the heat of chilli sauces. The technology might soon be available commercially as a cheap, disposable sensor for use in the food industry. Professor Richard Compton and his team at Oxford University have developed a sensitive technique to measure the levels of capsaicinoids, the substances that make chillies hot, in samples of chilli sauce. They report their findings in the Royal Society of Chemistry journal The Analyst. The current industry procedure is to use a panel of taste-testers, and is highly...

World food prices may worsen Burmese disaster 14:49 06 May 2008 NewScientist.com news service Debora MacKenzie As the scale of the disaster in Burma caused by Cyclone Nargis starts to emerge, relief agencies and rich countries are lining up to provide emergency aid. But with agencies already hit hard by soaring food prices, and Burma's own rice crop devastated, it is not clear where the relief will come from. Nargis hit Burma on Saturday, bringing with it a reported oceanic storm surge more than 3 metres high, which is said to have destroyed some low-lying towns. The storm wreaked havoc...

'Don't speak Spanish…can't get the job?' When San Bernardino High School teens Jazanique Jackson, Ashanae Brown and Kimyen Hawkins decided they wanted to work this summer, they left nothing to chance. They knew the rules: plan ahead; role play; be positive; adapt; relate and encourage. So when they hit the streets to start their summer job search they were prepared for virtually every eventuality except one. ¿No habla ingles? Can't speak Spanish.

CAMP STRIKER — The Yusifiyah Wholesale Farmers’ Market had a grand reopening last week after closing four years ago. “This was the center of commerce for the city before the war,” said Capt. Steve McGregor, from Longwood, Fla., projects officer for 3rd Battalion, 187th Infantry Regiment, 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault). “It shut down because of all the fighting ... It was the main way the farmers in this agrarian society made their money.” Now, the wholesale market may help turn a profit for local farmers. Regular markets only allow farmers to sell produce or goods...

FORWARD OPERATING BASE DELTA, Iraq, May 5, 2008 – Coalition forces conducted a medical assistance mission in Byda village, near Kut, Iraq, May 2. Capt. (Dr.) Frederico Gomez, a dentist with the Salvadoran Cuscatlan Battalion, extracts a tooth during a medical assistance mission in Byda village near Kut, Iraq, May 2, 2008. U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Daniel T. West  (Click photo for screen-resolution image);high-resolution image available. The mission is part of an outreach program to provide for outlying villages in Iraq’s Wasit province that have seen little or no coalition presence, said Army Lt. Col. Rob Jones, deputy team...

WASHINGTON—In March, inspectors checking Chinese seafood arriving at U.S. ports made some unsettling discoveries: fish infected with salmonella in Baltimore and Seattle, and shrimp with banned veterinary drugs in Florida. Meanwhile, a shipment intercepted in Los Angeles on March 19 and labeled "channel catfish" wasn't catfish at all, though records don't say what it was. "A lot of those products coming in from overseas, you have no clue as to what is in them," said Paul Hitchens, an aquaculture specialist in Southern Illinois, where cut-rate Chinese catfish are threatening the livelihood of fish farmers. China rapidly has become the leading...

Can't remember if an egg is fresh or hard boiled? Just spin the egg. If it wobbles, it's raw. If it spins easily, it's hard boiled. A fresh egg will sink in water, a stale one will float. Eggs contain all the essential protein, minerals and vitamins, except Vitamin C. But egg yolks are one of few foods that naturally contain Vitamin D. The colour of the egg shell is not related to quality, nutrients, flavour or cooking characteristics. White-shelled eggs are produced by hens with white feathers and white ear lobes. Brown-shelled eggs are produced by hens with red...

For a slight increase in output, there is a much greater input of chemicals. The excess chemicals are washed away and a large quantity reaches the sea. Some biologists fear that in the near future these chemicals will increase the dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico in which little, if any, life can be found. The irony is that we are sitting on an ocean of oil. If Congress, instead of burning food for motorfuel, would allow the exploitation of our own natural resources, the price of gasoline could be brought down to $1.50 per gallon. This would strengthen...

Staff Sgt. Joseph Marcy, of the 511th Military Police Co., shares a moment with Iraqi children after a food distribution mission in the Zuwerijat district of Al Kut, Iraq, April 30. U.S. Army Photo by Sgt. Daniel T. West. FOB DELTA — Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) and American Soldiers recently gave humanitarian assistance to more than 200 families in the Zuwarijat district of al-Kut, 163 kilometers southeast of Baghdad, as part of Operation Thunder II. The humanitarian mission furthered the operation’s goal of establishing a permanent ISF presence in the area.During Operation Thunder II, ISF occupied three buildings to serve...

Unlike its iconic American counterpart, the Oreo sold in China is frequently long, thin, four-layered and coated in chocolate. But both kinds of cookies have one important thing in common: They are now best sellers. The Oreo has long been the top-selling cookie in the U.S. market. But Kraft Foods had to reinvent the Oreo to make it sell well in the world's most populous nation. While Chinese Oreo sales represent a tiny fraction of Kraft's $37.2 billion in annual revenue, the cookie's journey in China exemplifies the kind of entrepreneurial transformation that CEO Irene Rosenfeld is trying to spread...

Food Shortages Growing? An email from a reader in the Midwest causes me some concern: "Last night at the daughter's horse riding lesson the price of horse feed came between my wife & the stable owner/riding instructor. One of her friends in Kansas said that his winter wheat looked great, but there was no wheat in the wheat plant heads (kernel/seed-I don't know the correct term). He reported that the grain miller that they normally use said that they are having trouble getting any wheat to prepare. Same thing from many Kansas wheat growers; plants look great, but no wheat...

Food crisis looms for Japan as prices rise By Julian Ryall, in Tokyo Last Updated: 1:04AM BST 02/05/2008 Japan is facing its first food shortages in almost 40 years, with supermarkets close to running short of stocks. In the last month, the price of milk, soy sauce, bread, noodles, pasta and cooking oil have all risen as makers are forced to pass on rising costs. Butter has already begun to disappear from supermarket shelves as surging global grain prices make it impossible for Japan's dairy farmers to increase milk production. Retailers warn that other goods could follow soon. With the...

Things are slow. Students are doing finals this week and last. I'll be busy correcting about 24 test papers next week. I may be moving from my house. The property manager is demanding we pay for water, electricity, salary for "gardener", and night security. He and I have had several nose-to-nose discussions. He was down on his knees begging me to leave but now my lease is up. I'd rather stay there but it's up to John. He thinks he can get a better place for less. The Nigerian couple across from me are moving, the American man across the...

Haiti facing 'major food crisis' Malnutrition is widespread in Haiti, one of the poorest countries in the world Haiti faces a "major crisis" if the international community does not increase food aid to the country, the UN's food agency has warned. The World Food Programme director for the region, Pedro Medrano, said Haiti required more help to feed its poor. He appealed for $54m (£27m) in new funding to counter food prices which have risen sharply around the world. At least six people were killed in Haiti last month as protests over rising prices turned violent. The prices of wheat,...

XUAN CANH, Vietnam — Truong Thi Nha stands just four and a half feet tall. Her three grown children tower over her, just as many young people in this village outside Hanoi dwarf their parents. The biggest reason the children are so robust: fertilizer. Ms. Nha, her face weathered beyond its 51 years, said her growth was stunted by a childhood of hunger and malnutrition. Just a few decades ago, crop yields here were far lower and diets much worse. Then the widespread use of inexpensive chemical fertilizer, coupled with market reforms, helped power an agricultural explosion here that had...

WASHINGTON: The "improvement in the diets of people in India and China", which is forcing the governments there to keep food "inside" is a cause for the current global supply shortage, US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has said. In an interactive session at the Peace Corps 2008 Country Directors Conference, Rice said the ongoing food crisis was mainly due to "four causes", even as she specifically pointed out the exchange rate and the simple "inability" of getting food to the people. "There are, kind of, four causes that we really have to look at. Weve got to understand better...

American portions reduce as food prices rise By Tom Leonard and Alex Spillius Last Updated: 1:57AM BST 30/04/2008 Faced with growing delivery costs driven by higher fuel prices, many US restaurants have done the previously unthinkable and introduced smaller food portions served on smaller plates. The increase in fuel prices was identified yesterday as the biggest issue affecting the lives of ordinary Americans. It surpassed even unemployment and home repossessions, according to a survey by the Kaiser Family Foundation. Until now, Americans have taken for granted the relative cheapness of petrol and food. Although $3·60 (£1·80) for a gallon of...

As everyone knows by this point, we are in the midst of a food crisis. Domestic prices of basic foods have risen by 46% over the past year, putting even more pressure on already stressed consumers. Overseas, food riots have occurred in Haiti, Cameroon, Burkina Faso, Egypt, Indonesia, Yemen, and as close to our borders as Mexico. These riots were severe enough to bring down the Haitian government of Jacques Edouard Alexis. Others may follow. Any number of explanations have been offered. Global warming has taken its accustomed bow, only to be immediately pushed to one side by other candidates...

They don't have enough to eat. Five people are dead in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, after a week of food riots. Unions in Burkina Faso have called a general strike to protest the high cost of grain. Food riots have rocked Egypt, Cameroon, Indonesia, Ethiopia and other nations. In Manila, police with M-16s have supervised the sale and distribution of subsidized grain. Hoarders have been threatened with life imprisonment. In Thailand and Pakistan, troops are guarding fields and warehouses. In Egypt, the army has been called out to bake bread. Even in the United States, a run on rice caused big-box retailers...

World food price crisis blamed on government neglect 18:31 29 April 2008 NewScientist.com news service Debora MacKenzie Fund another Green Revolution – or people will starve. That's the message from heads of several international farm research institutes galvanised by the food price crisis. Scientists who run three of the world's leading international agricultural research labs say the worldwide surge in food prices is a predictable result of the neglect of agricultural research over the past two decades. They say the only way to prevent further price hikes, starvation and political instability is to fund more research into increased crop yields....

April 28, 2008, 7:24 a.m. The Biofuels Disaster Must EndAnother failed energy policy, courtesy of the Washington central planners. By Phil Kerpen & James Valvo Big-government, command-and-control technocrats believe that when central planning fails, the solution is a better plan and smarter planners. They never step back and look at whether planning makes sense in the first place. This was true of the Soviet Union, with tragic five-year plan after five-year plan. It was true of Communist China, with Mao’s revolutionary upheavals. And today, here in the United States, it is true of government energy policy. The 1970s and...

Vast amounts of money are flooding the world's commodities markets, driving up prices of staple foods like wheat and rice. Biofuels and droughts can't fully explain the recent food crisis -- hedge funds and small investors bear some responsibility for global hunger. Not long ago, Dwight Anderson welcomed reporters with open arms. He liked to entertain them with stories from the world of big money. Anderson is a New York hedge fund manager, and as recently as last October he would talk with enthusiasm about his visits to Malaysian palm-oil plantations and Brazilian grain farms. "You could clearly see how...

Just a hop, skip and a jump from the city, Gothenburg's archipelago is a great place to get away from it all, writes Matt O'Leary. Gothenburg’s archipelago (or, more accurately, archipelagos, as the islands form two clearly-defined and differently-named clusters) consists of dozens of islands which stretch into the sea next to the city’s coastline. Each of the main islands shares a few defining characteristics which make them attractive to first-time visitors and annually-returning guests alike; however, this isn’t to say that they’re indistinguishable. Far from it, in fact: many of the individual islands have charm and features galore to...

It will take some time before genetically modified crops can help the world's starving people. One reason is that agricultural corporations are developing the wrong types of plants. In emerging economies like Argentina and India, most GM crops are cultivated for use in export products. Sometimes the solutions to humanity's problems are only a mouse click away. "How do you feed half a billion people in the desert?" a graphic on the Web site of the Africa Biofortified Sorghum (ABS) project asks. The answer it proposes is: "Super Sorghum!"

HO CHI MINH CITY (Reuters) - Vietnam banned rice speculation after a surge in buying over the weekend in southern Vietnam but said it had sufficient stocks for domestic consumption and exports. The ban is the latest sign of growing unease over food supplies around Asia, where some governments have been spooked by the possibility of a shortfall in staple rice and a three-fold price increase caused by export curbs by key suppliers including Vietnam, the world's number-two exporter. On Saturday, people rushed to supermarkets in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam's largest urban area, to buy the staple food as...

Reporting on the food crisis in Haiti last week, The Washington Times introduced its readership to the term "Clorox hunger," described as "a hunger so painful it feels like your stomach is being eaten by bleach or battery acid." It's horrifying stuff. But that's what the global food crisis -- which many economists now believe will push 100 million people into "absolute poverty," and which will do far worse to those already below the absolute poverty line -- looks like. Higher food prices mean less food. In America, that's an annoyance. In other countries, that's a death sentence. And it's...

The Nobel Prize-winning economist Milton Friedman once said, "One of the great mistakes is to judge policies and programs by their intentions rather than their results." When Congress passed legislation to greatly expand America's commitment to biofuels, it intended to create energy independence and protect the environment. But the results have been quite different. America remains equally dependent on foreign sources of energy, and new evidence suggests that ethanol is causing great harm to the environment. In recent weeks, the correlation between government biofuel mandates and rapidly rising food prices has become undeniable. At a time when the U.S. economy...

Food: Today's headlines are filled with Americans expressing their fears of food shortages and frustration with spiraling grocery prices. As part of the solution, it's time to give genetically modified crops a try.There's much resistance to overcome, however. In the fall of 2006, Friends of the Earth publicly asked governments in the hungry African countries of Ghana and Sierra Leone to recall American food aid that contained genetically modified rice. Four years earlier, when southern Africa was tormented by famine, the U.S. offered 540,000 tons of genetically modified grain. Though the World Health Organization estimated that nearly 14 million Africans,...

Despite bumper crops in Vietnam and India, export limits and bans have created a global shortage and driven up prices. At the Costco in San Francisco, rice is all the rage. Not long after the 10 a.m. opening on Apr. 24, the warehouse club was well on its way to selling out the day's supply of Thai jasmine rice. Within an hour, customers cleared three pallets loaded with 50-lb. bags of Super Lucky Elephant brand jasmine rice from Thailand. Real estate broker Mary Jane Galviso snapped up two bags—the limit imposed by this particular store. "This is very frightening," says...

Gore Ducks, as a Backlash Builds Against Biofuels The campaign against climate change could be set back by the global food crisis, as foreign populations turn against measures to use foodstuffs as substitutes for fossil fuels. With prices for rice, wheat, and corn soaring, food-related unrest has broken out in places such as Haiti, Indonesia, and Afghanistan. Several countries have blocked the export of grain. There is even talk that governments could fall if they cannot bring food costs down. One factor being blamed for the price hikes is the use of government subsidies to promote the use of corn...

NEW YORK: The United Nations food agency has sounded a fresh alarm that fast rising food prices across the globe are eroding its capacity to serve millions of people already dependent on it and the situation could worsen with millions being pushed into poverty forcing them to seek its help. With the major exporters banning rice exports, shortages are expected to be felt around the world. Soaring food prices- up 55 per cent from June 2007 to February 2008, and dwindling global food stocks due to more world food consumption than production are seriously threatening the United Nations ability to...

I don't want to alarm anybody, but maybe it's time for Americans to start stockpiling food. No, this is not a drill. You've seen the TV footage of food riots in parts of the developing world. Yes, they're a long way away from the U.S. But most foodstuffs operate in a global market. When the cost of wheat soars in Asia, it will do the same here. Reality: Food prices are already rising here much faster than the returns you are likely to get from keeping your money in a bank or money-market fund. And there are very good reasons...

UN forced to halt Gaza food aid to a million By Tim Butcher in Jerusalem Last Updated: 2:38am BST 25/04/2008 The United Nations says it is being forced to stop delivering food aid to Gaza because of the fuel shortages caused by Israel's response to militant attacks. Palestinian refugees carry UN food aid at a Rafah refugee campAlmost a million Palestinians will go hungry if the UN stops deliveries, compounding an already dire humanitarian situation. The fuel blockade means pumps have already been turned off, causing water shortages and sewage problems, while the vaccination stocks at Gaza's main hospital were...

An escalating global food crisis could bring the problem of hunger home to the US and other developed countries. Millions of poor Americans risk going hungry if food prices continue to rise and food agencies struggle to cope with rising costs, dwindling resources and a huge increase in demand. Already more and more poor people in the US are turning to charity and government assistance as they struggle with rising food costs and soaring fuel bills. Even some stores are restricting bulk rice purchases as the grain reached a fresh high on Thursday. Laurie True, executive director of the California...

Families are having to spend almost £800 more on their annual grocery bills as the highest rate of food inflation for a generation drives up supermarket prices, research suggested yesterday. The cost of a basket of 24 basic items such as tea bags, milk, cornflakes and pasta sauce at the three biggest stores has risen by 15 per cent over the past year.   Compare prices of 24 grocery items A kilo of Tesco garden peas has increased from £1.10 to £1.79; a dozen medium free-range eggs from Sainsbury's has climbed from £1.75 to £2.58; and a bag of fusilli...

Fads come fast and furious in our viral age, and the reactions to them can be equally ferocious. That’s what we’re seeing right now with biofuels, which everyone loved until everyone decided they were the worst thing since the Black Death. Where fuel distilled from plant matter was once hailed as an answer to everything from global warming to the geo-strategic power shift favoring repressive one-pipeline oil states, its now a “scam” and “part of the problem,” according to Time magazine. Ethanol has turned awful. The supposed crimes of biofuels are manifold. They’re behind soaring global commodity prices, the destruction...

Farmers and food executives appealed fruitlessly to federal officials yesterday for regulatory steps to limit speculative buying that is helping to drive food prices higher. Meanwhile, some Americans are stocking up on staples such as rice, flour and oil in anticipation of high prices and shortages spreading from overseas. Their pleas did not find a sympathetic audience at the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC), where regulators said high prices are mostly the result of soaring world demand for grains combined with high fuel prices and drought-induced shortages in many countries. The regulatory clash came amid evidence that a rash of...

WASHINGTON (AP) - Federal regulators on Tuesday said placing tougher restrictions on agricultural commodity trading will not alleviate high and volatile prices in those markets, and could make matters worse. Farmers, ranchers and grain processors met with regulators in Washington to discuss the causes behind turbulent markets and historically high prices for wheat, corn and other foodstuffs. Farmers and food producers argue speculation by Wall Street investors -- not a supply-demand imbalance -- is what's driving up prices and volatility, making it harder for commercial buyers and sellers of grain to use the exchanges as a tool for limiting the...

Wheat prices climbed for a fifth consecutive session Thursday, and the most heavily traded contract hit a new all-time high on the Chicago Board of Trade as traders continue to price in robust worldwide demand and shrinking supply. The U.S. Department of Agriculture said Thursday that wheat supplies available for export plummeted in July and said "stocks could be driven down to unprecedented low levels." Rain, frost and drought in different parts of the European Union ravaged wheat crops this year, leaving the EU with less to export and boosting its import requirements. Poor weather also ruined crops in the...

As the world faces its first global food crisis since World War II, even American consumers are starting to fret. Media reports are starting to trickle in about grocers limiting some food purchases, while Costco Wholesale Corp. is seeing higher-than-usual demand for staple foods such as rice and flour as consumers appear to be stocking up. Costco Chief Executive James Sinegal told Reuters news service in an interview Tuesday that the Issaquah-based wholesale company is managing the situation. "If we run out, we're usually back in stock the next day," he said. The Reuters story followed a Monday article in...

MUMBAI, April 23 (Reuters) - Indian corn futures ended higher on Wednesday on media reports that the deputy chairman of the Planning Commission was opposed to a ban on commodities futures trade, analysts said. Planning Commission Deputy Chairman Montek Singh Ahluwalia on Tuesday opposed suggestions to ban futures trade in commodities, the Business Standard paper reported. "Some recovery was seen ...there could be some more rise..prices had fallen quite a bit in last few days," said an analyst with Motilal Oswal Commodities Broker Private Ltd. Strong export demand also supported the gains, they said. India is likely to export 2.1...