The fallout of rising food and gas prices: Could some good be wrapped in the bad?

By Marina Knight

First, I’d like to welcome you all to our new staff blog. We hope it will be insightful. The goal is to give our readers interesting, behind-the-scenes insights that might spark conversation and inspire thought. Please feel free to comment on what you read by simply clicking the comment link at the bottom of each post.
The headlines have recently been dominated by the rising cost of food and the outrageous price of gasoline. Aside from when Hillary will pull out of the race, the mainstream media seem to be interested in little else.
Would it be bombastic to think that some good could come from the horror?
In the case of the rising gas prices, the argument is strong. We all know about global warming and it seems naysayers can no longer refute the science and the numbers that show human impact has accelerated the crisis. In Vermont, driving cars accounts for 44 percent of the pollution we green-staters emit.
If gas becomes too expensive, perhaps people will begin to drive less.
Prices at the pump today are still much lower than those in Europe. If you think it’s expensive to drive here, go there. From firsthand experience, a full tank of gas will run you about $80. It’s been this way for years, and high prices have turned people to public transportation.
Recently, that has started to happen here, too. Just a week ago, the Reporter’s Jesse Roman reported that Green Mountain Transit numbers are on the rise, in large part due to the increased price of gas and broader awareness and concern for the environment.
Drivers in America last year laid down just over 3 trillion miles, down 12.2 billion or 0.4 percent, according to the Federal Highway Administration's monthly Traffic Volume Trends.
Americans drove less for the first time in 27 years. If this is linked to the cost of gas, keep it on the rise.
The second headline dominator will be more difficult to argue. It is hard to see the good in the rising price of food that is sparking unrest in poor countries around the globe. Higher food prices have affected Vermonters to a much lesser extent than the world’s poorest populations. Perhaps the best thing to do in a crisis like this is learn from our mistakes.
The story has brought attention to the fact that turning farms into fuel plants may not be the best fix for high global oil prices. Didn’t anyone see that, when you ask the rice farmer to grow crops that power cars instead of people, people might get hungry? Instead of Congress mandating a fivefold increase in the use of biofuels last year, perhaps it should have simply mandated that people drive less.
We should assess which hunger is more fierce; our hunger for basic foods or our hunger for oil.