Smithfield Foods chief has beef with ethanol

Posted to: Business
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By Philip Walzer
The Virginian-Pilot
© September 13, 2009

Smithfield Foods CEO C. Larry Pope had ethanol on his mind last week.

Twice he denounced the federal government's policy of setting aside about 30 percent of the corn crop to create the alternative fuel. Both times, he used the same analogy.

"For goodness' sake, you don't burn the floors in your house for heat in the wintertime," he said Tuesday during a conference call about first-quarter earnings. "Yes, your floors will work well to heat your house, but it's not an economical way to heat your home for very long."

The ethanol set-asides, he said, have driven up corn prices, sending hog-raising costs soaring.

Smithfield lost $108 million in the first quarter of fiscal 2010; its hog-production unit posted a $162 million loss.

In a talk Thursday at Barclays Capital's Back-to-School Consumer Conference, Pope said the ethanol strategy "makes absolutely no sense at all" and is "devastating to small farmers in this country." team?

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MPG

Submitted by ssdamore752 on Mon, 09/14/2009 at 10:41 am.

If you watch you mileage with gas with ethonal and without, you will see a difference with the without giving you better mileage. I've found in my 2000 Buick Century, my mileage on the highway drops from 36-37 to 32-33 MPGs. On the highway that equates to about 60 miles to the tank before really having to fill back up. Or an extra $5.00 or so in fill ups.