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Long‐Run Impact of Biofuels on Food Prices

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  • Ujjayant Chakravorty
  • Marie‐Hélène Hubert
  • Michel Moreaux
  • Linda Nøstbakken
Abstract
About 40 percent of US corn is now used to produce biofuels, which are used as substitutes for gasoline in transportation. In this paper, we use a Ricardian model with differential land quality to show that world food prices could rise by about 32 percent by 2022. About half of this increase is from the biofuel mandate and the rest is a result of demand‐side effects in the form of population growth and income‐induced changes in dietary preferences, from cereals to meat and dairy products. However, aggregate world carbon emissions would increase, because of significant land conversion to farming and leakage from lower oil prices.

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  • Ujjayant Chakravorty & Marie‐Hélène Hubert & Michel Moreaux & Linda Nøstbakken, 2017. "Long‐Run Impact of Biofuels on Food Prices," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 119(3), pages 733-767, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:scandj:v:119:y:2017:i:3:p:733-767
    DOI: 10.1111/sjoe.12177
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    Cited by:

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    5. Eissa, Mohamad Abdelaziz & Al Refai, Hisham, 2019. "Modelling the symmetric and asymmetric relationships between oil prices and those of corn, barley, and rapeseed oil," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 64(C).
    6. Stephen P. Holland & Jonathan E. Hughes & Christopher R. Knittel & Nathan C. Parker, 2013. "Unintended Consequences of Transportation Carbon Policies: Land-Use, Emissions, and Innovation," NBER Working Papers 19636, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    7. Ujjayant Chakravorty & Marie‐Hélène Hubert & Beyza Ural Marchand, 2019. "Food for fuel: The effect of the US biofuel mandate on poverty in India," Quantitative Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 10(3), pages 1153-1193, July.
    8. Duc Hong Vo & Tan Ngoc Vu & Anh The Vo & Michael McAleer, 2019. "Modeling the Relationship between Crude Oil and Agricultural Commodity Prices," Energies, MDPI, vol. 12(7), pages 1-41, April.
    9. Mattias, Gaglio & Elena, Tamburini & Giuseppe, Castaldelli & Anna, Fano Elisa, 2021. "Modeling the ecosystem service of agricultural residues provision for bioenergy production: A potential application in the Emilia-Romagna region (Italy)," Ecological Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 451(C).
    10. Bilgili, Faik & Koçak, Emrah & Kuşkaya, Sevda & Bulut, Ümit, 2020. "Estimation of the co-movements between biofuel production and food prices: A wavelet-based analysis," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 213(C).
    11. Yongyang Cai & Kenneth Judd & Jevgenijs Steinbuks, 2017. "A nonlinear certainty equivalent approximation method for dynamic stochastic problems," Quantitative Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 8(1), pages 117-147, March.
    12. Yuehjen E. Shao & Jun-Ting Dai, 2018. "Integrated Feature Selection of ARIMA with Computational Intelligence Approaches for Food Crop Price Prediction," Complexity, Hindawi, vol. 2018, pages 1-17, July.
    13. Curtis McKnight & Feng Qiu & Marty Luckert & Grant Hauer, 2021. "Prices for a second‐generation biofuel industry in Canada: Market linkages between Canadian wheat and US energy and agricultural commodities," Canadian Journal of Agricultural Economics/Revue canadienne d'agroeconomie, Canadian Agricultural Economics Society/Societe canadienne d'agroeconomie, vol. 69(3), pages 337-351, September.
    14. Amigues, Jean-Pierre & Moreaux, Michel, 2018. "Competing Land Uses and Fossil Fuel, Optimal Energy Conversion Rates During the Transition Toward a Green Economy Under a Pollution Stock Constraint," TSE Working Papers 18-981, Toulouse School of Economics (TSE).
    15. Palacio-Ciro, Santiago & Vasco-Correa, Carlos Andrés, 2020. "Biofuels policy in Colombia: A reconfiguration to the sugar and palm sectors?," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 134(C).
    16. Ujjayant Chakravorty & Marie-Hélène Hubert & Beyza Ural Marchand, 2016. "The effect of the US biofuels mandate on poverty in India," Economics Working Paper Archive (University of Rennes & University of Caen) 2016-13, Center for Research in Economics and Management (CREM), University of Rennes, University of Caen and CNRS.

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    JEL classification:

    • Q24 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Renewable Resources and Conservation - - - Land
    • Q32 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Nonrenewable Resources and Conservation - - - Exhaustible Resources and Economic Development
    • Q42 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Energy - - - Alternative Energy Sources

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