Food Companies Behind Ethanol Smear Campaign

The Capitol Hill publication Roll Call has revealed that the nation’s largest food corporations have been waging war on ethanol over the past few month.

Roll Call, which obtained confidential documentation of the effort, reported Wednesday, “Rising food and fuel prices have led the biofuels industry to take a beating on Capitol Hill the past few weeks. But the pummeling hasn’t been by chance — it’s part of a concerted effort spearheaded by the Grocery Manufacturers Association and the Glover Park Group. GMA has been leading an ‘aggressive’ public relations campaign for the past two months in an effort to roll back ethanol mandates that passed in last year’s energy bill.”

Among the documents obtained by Roll Call was the GMA’s proposal request “to build a groundswell in support of freezing or reversing some provisions of the 2007 Energy Bill and for the elimination/reform of ethanol subsidies and import restrictions.”

Glover Park Group’s proposal response included the number one objective to “obliterate whatever intellectual justification might still exist for corn-based ethanol among policy elites.”

These documents should be viewed with outrage by every farmer and ethanol producer in the country.
GMA’s Request for Proposal
Glover Park Group’s Media Campaign Proposal