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Log inMaine bread company bashes U.S. fuel policy
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Maine bread company bashes U.S. fuel policy
by Outspoken on Thu May 08, 2008 4:19 pm
Maine bread company bashes U.S. fuel policy
By Anne Ravana
Staff Writer Bangor Daily News
A Maine bread company executive testifying before a Senate committee in Washington on Wednesday said the federal government’s renewable fuel policy has encouraged skyrocketing food prices.
Andrew Siegel, vice president and treasurer of York-based When Pigs Fly Sourdough Bread Co., told the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee that his company went from spending $7,600 a week on flour last September to as much as $28,000 a week in February. Currently the price has settled to about $15,000 per week for the roughly 50,000 pounds of flour the bakery uses.
"We have raised our prices. Customers are upset and our employees are feeling the pain due to no pay raises and increased costs of all their living expenses," Siegel said. "I think that we will survive this crisis. My fear is that … next year we will not be so lucky."
Siegel was one of four witnesses who spoke about whether agricultural subsidies aimed at reducing the nation’s reliance on imported oil are having serious, unintended consequences for food supplies and prices.
Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, the committee’s ranking member, initiated the hearing, which she said was an unlikely topic for the Senate Agriculture committee to take up because its members are strongly in favor of the subsidies.
The federal biofuel subsidies, which heavily favor the use of food-based fuels such as ethanol made from corn, have diverted acreage from crops such as wheat and soybeans and has had ripple effects on the cost of those foods, Collins said.
Other factors driving up prices include Asian countries that are using more grains to feed livestock, poor weather conditions that have yielded a diminished wheat crop, and the role of speculation in the commodities markets, Collins said.
http://bangornews.com/news/t/news.aspx?articleid=164069&zoneid=500
By Anne Ravana
Staff Writer Bangor Daily News
A Maine bread company executive testifying before a Senate committee in Washington on Wednesday said the federal government’s renewable fuel policy has encouraged skyrocketing food prices.
Andrew Siegel, vice president and treasurer of York-based When Pigs Fly Sourdough Bread Co., told the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee that his company went from spending $7,600 a week on flour last September to as much as $28,000 a week in February. Currently the price has settled to about $15,000 per week for the roughly 50,000 pounds of flour the bakery uses.
"We have raised our prices. Customers are upset and our employees are feeling the pain due to no pay raises and increased costs of all their living expenses," Siegel said. "I think that we will survive this crisis. My fear is that … next year we will not be so lucky."
Siegel was one of four witnesses who spoke about whether agricultural subsidies aimed at reducing the nation’s reliance on imported oil are having serious, unintended consequences for food supplies and prices.
Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, the committee’s ranking member, initiated the hearing, which she said was an unlikely topic for the Senate Agriculture committee to take up because its members are strongly in favor of the subsidies.
The federal biofuel subsidies, which heavily favor the use of food-based fuels such as ethanol made from corn, have diverted acreage from crops such as wheat and soybeans and has had ripple effects on the cost of those foods, Collins said.
Other factors driving up prices include Asian countries that are using more grains to feed livestock, poor weather conditions that have yielded a diminished wheat crop, and the role of speculation in the commodities markets, Collins said.
http://bangornews.com/news/t/news.aspx?articleid=164069&zoneid=500
"Music is a moral law. It gives soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination, and charm and gaiety to life and to everything."
Plato (427-347 BC)
Plato (427-347 BC)
