Why It’s Wrong to Agree with the Malthusians about Ethanol

By Robert Zubrin

 

In an op-ed article printed in the Denver Post May 8, editorial columnist Vince Carroll endorsed the view of population control advocate Lester Brown that the U.S. corn ethanol program is threatening the world’s poor with starvation. This endorsement is especially remarkable in view of the fact that, as the otherwise generally astute Mr. Carroll has correctly noted many times in the past, all of Lester Brown’s many previous limited-resources doomsday predictions have proven wildly incorrect.

In fact, Lester Brown is wrong about the alleged famine-inducing potential of the ethanol program for exactly the same reason he has been repeatedly wrong about the alleged famine-inducing potential of population growth. There is not a fixed amount of grain in the world. Farmers produce in response to demand. The more customers, the more grain. Not only that, but the larger the potential market, the greater the motivation for investment in improved techniques.

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