permaculture

[Jeremy O'Leary <jeremy@biohabit.org>]

I figured folks might find this article interesting.

http://www.worldwatch.org/node/5302

The increase in world agriculture prices caused by the global boom in
biofuels could benefit many of the world’s rural poor—one of many
conclusions of a landmark new 450-page book, Biofuels for Transport:
Global Potential and Implications for Energy and Agriculture, authored
by Worldwatch and published by Earthscan. 

“Decades of declining agricultural prices have been reversed thanks to
the growing use of biofuels,” says Christopher Flavin, president of the
Institute. “Farmers in some of the poorest nations have been decimated
by U.S. and European subsidies to crops such as corn, cotton, and sugar.
Today’s higher prices may allow them to sell their crops at a decent
price, but major agriculture reforms and infrastructure development will
be needed to ensure that the increased benefits go to the world’s 800
million undernourished people, most of whom live in rural areas.”

Biofuels for Transport, undertaken with support from the German Ministry
of Food, Agriculture, and Consumer Protection, assesses the range of
“sustainability” issues the biofuels industry will present in the years
ahead, ranging from implications for the global climate and water
resources to biological diversity and the world’s poor. The book finds
that rising food prices are a hardship for some urban poor, who will
need increased assistance from the World Food Programme and other relief
efforts. However, it notes that the central cause of food scarcity is
poverty, and seeking food security by driving agricultural prices ever
lower will hurt more people than it helps.

Growth in biofuels production may have unexpected economic benefits,
according to the experts who contributed to the report. Of the 47
poorest countries, 38 are net importers of oil and 25 import all of
their oil; for these nations, the tripling in oil prices has been an
economic disaster. But nations that develop domestic biofuels industries
will be able to purchase fuel from their own farmers rather than
spending scarce foreign exchange on imported oil.

World biofuels production rose 28 percent to 44 billion liters in 2006,
according to the figures compiled since research on Biofuels for
Transport was completed; fuel ethanol was up 22 percent and biodiesel
rose 80 percent. Although biofuels comprise less than 1 percent of the
global liquid fuel supply, the surge in production of biofuels in 2006
met 17 percent of the increase in supply of all liquid fuels worldwide
last year.

Nations that develop domestic biofuels industries will be able to
purchase fuel from their own farmers rather than spending scarce foreign
exchange on imported oil. This rapid growth is having unintended
impacts. Large-scale biofuels production can threaten biodiversity, as
seen recently with palm oil plantations in Indonesia that are
encroaching on forests and edging out the endangered orangutan
population, worrying European consumers who have begun importing palm
oil from Southeast Asia. In Brazil, the Cerrado, a vast landscape of
biologically rich forests, brush, and pasture just south of the Amazon,
is coming under pressure as sugar cane cultivation expands.

“It is critical to the stability of the climate that we prevent biofuels
from expanding at the expense of rainforests and other valuable
ecosystems that store carbon and provide other ecological services,”
says Suzanne Hunt, who directed the team of 15 researchers from four
countries.“Energy crops should instead be established on the millions of
hectares of degraded land that can be found around the world.” 

“Current biofuels production methods place a heavy burden on land and
water resources, due in part to the fossil fuel- and chemical-intensive
corn that is used to produce over half the world’s ethanol,” says Hunt.
“Farming practices need to be reexamined if agriculture is to provide
energy as well as food for a rapidly growing global population that is
hungry for both.”

The book concludes that the long-term potential of biofuels is in the
use of non-food feedstock, including agricultural and forestry wastes,
as well as fast-growing, cellulose-rich energy crops such as perennial
grasses and trees. Following the model of Brazil’s sugar cane-based
biofuels industry, cellulosic ethanol could dramatically reduce the
carbon dioxide and nitrogen pollution that results from today’s biofuel
crops.

“Farming practices need to be reexamined if agriculture is to provide
energy as well as food for a rapidly growing global population that is
hungry for both.” “The question is not whether biofuels will play a
major part in the global transportation fuel market, but when and at
what price,” says Flavin. “The first priority should be to ensure that
the industry develops sustainably—so that the problems of an oil-based
economy are not replaced by another socially and ecologically bankrupt
industry.”

The book recommends policies that protect natural resources and support
a speedy transition to improved biofuels technologies. Freer trade in
biofuels should be coupled with social and environmental certification
and a credible system to certify compliance.

“Biofuels alone will not solve the world’s transportation-related energy
problems,” the authors conclude. “Development of these fuels must occur
within the context of a transition to a more efficient, less polluting
and more diversified global transport sector. They must be part of a
portfolio of options that includes dramatic improvements in vehicle fuel
economy, investment in public transportation, and better urban
planning.”