I'm not sure I see the "engineered" part of the shortage.
Unless you're (correctly) suggesting that by reducing the ethanol requirement in fuel the price of grain could be lowered thereby reducing the cost of feed and reducing the number of livestock slaughtered this year thusly increasing the number available for slaughter next year and eliminating the shortage. However, that would be engineer a solution to the shortage, not engineering the shortage itself.
Right now, the way I see it is that it seems to be a direct impact of the recent drought.
The impact of corn for ethanol on food prices and crops is something that's been an issue for years separate and apart from the current economic/environmental conditions.
Ethanol was an engineered solution to low corn prices. Not so many years ago farmers had to raise livestock using the corn they raised as feed in order to pay the costs of raising the grain. We produce so much grain in this country that the historic markets could not support a reasonable price for it. Ethanol opened up a new market for some of the surplus.
Now that the surplus is smaller, the drought we are going through will cause farmers who were able to expand livestock operations while selling their grain on the spot market and buying feed stocks in the futures market can't make the numbers wash anymore. Hence, downsizing the feedlots.
The last few years have been an anomaly in farm commodities. High grain prices, high livestock prices, dramatically higher yields and lower overall chemical expenses have driven up profits all through the supply chains. If things go back to a more normal set of circumstances the only group that will lose income is the farmers.
Paul