Brazil has been using ethanol for over thirty years resulting,inspite of an increased population, a drop in petrol consumption. Whilst the Brazil economy is not the same size as the USA but it is still a large country with a large population and one wonders why this has not, in the past effected the price of food.
'Brazil’s 30-year-old ethanol fuel program uses cheap sugar cane, mainly bagasse (cane-waste) for process heat and power, and modern equipment, and provides a ~22% ethanol blend used nationwide, plus 100% anhydrous ethanol for four million cars. The Brazilian ethanol program provided nearly 700,000 jobs in 2003, and cut 1975–2002 oil imports by a cumulative undiscounted total of US$50 billion.[1] Today, Brazil gets more than 40% of its automobile fuels from sugar cane-based ethanol.[2] Ethanol production is predicted to reach at least 26.4 billion litres in Brazil during 2008.'[3]
