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Mr. Gore you are robbing Peter, paying Paul

Iqbal Latif - 4/12/2008

More people are expected to die of famine in Africa than imprinting a larger CO2 footprint. 'Al Gore Environmental policies' are aimed at 'Robbing Peter paying Paul.' Green based priorities are creating severe food shortages. Hunger in African will kill faster and will have larger impact on the flimsy structure of the growing under class of the world.Is human life less than a computer driven theoretical reading of rising CO2 emissions? Lets not forget we all make mistakes, computer generated models are far inferior than human complex life, we owe it to our conscious to save every human being. Malthus and many others had made dire predictions, and lets not take our eye off Club of Rome predictions or even our guru Carl Sagan predicted that 1991 Kuwait oil well fires will lead South Asia to winter of death, South Asia had the best crops since then.

In a display of over enthusiasm to grow crops for biofuels to control toxic emissions a lot of agricultural land has been diverted away from food and led to severe price hikes. Robert Zoellick, World Bank's president, says that food prices have risen by 83% in the past three years. The price of wheat had risen by 120% in the past year, more than doubling the cost of a loaf of bread. Rice prices were up by 75% in just two months.

The Guardian reports that in Bangladesh a 2kg bag of rice now consumes almost half of the daily income of a poor family. With little margin for survival, rising prices too often means fewer meals, Poor people in Yemen were now spending more than a quarter of their income on bread. The Bank's analysis chimes with research from the International Monetary Fund which shows that Africa will be the hardest hit continent from rising food prices. More than 20 African countries will see their trade balance worsen by more than 1% of GDP through having to pay more for food. Robert Zoellick, the Bank's president, called on rich countries to commit an extra $500m (£250m) immediately to the World Food Programme, and sign up to what he called a "New Deal for global food policy".

The economic impact of all this cannot be overemphasized higher inflation as a result of higher food costs will lead to economic slowdowns as interest rates may have to escalated instead of being cut ( to encourage recovery) to contain food inflation, a scenario of stagflation is possible if this foolish diversion of resources in developing expensive biofuels from crops is not altered.

The hardest hit from such global economic situation will be the countries on the lowest rung of poverty ladder. Will someone put some senses to divert this whole dialog on environment on a more human footing. Environment at the cost of mass famine and fewer morsels in the mouth of those who need the most is very poor judgment. Death of a poverty stricken individual is a death of a whole generation, lets stop playing God and stop fiddling with mother nature that has created us over 13.6 billion years of complex creation from nothingness.