Report Urges Global Evaluation of Biofuel Policies
European and American policies encouraging biofuel production are making some of the poorest women across the world go hungry, warns ActionAid in its latest report titled “Food, Farmers and Fuel: Balancing Global Grain and Energy Policies with Sustainable Land Use” released at the Brazilian Biofuels conference in Sao Paolo.
ActionAid is pushing for national regulation of biofuels production, the creation of a U.N. commission to judge social and environmental impacts and a moratorium on any further use of land for biofuel production until this commission reports back. Ahead of the EU parliamentary vote on biofuels targets in December, ActionAid is also asking members of the European Parliament to scrap targets and subsidies all together.
“In 2007, the EU used 2.85m hectares of farmable land to grow crops for agrofuels, rather than food,” said Laura Hurtado, Food Rights Coordinator at ActionAid Guatemala.
“This has fueled rising food prices and threatened millions more with hunger,” Hurtado added. “Because Europe does not have enough land, it is increasingly looking to developing countries to meet its targets on biofuels. This will only intensify the food crisis.”
The excessive demand created by the United States and EU agrofuel incentives and targets has also contributed to food price volatility around the world. Prices shot up earlier this year because there were expectations that huge amounts of corn, sugar and other feedstocks would be needed to satisfy the United States and EU targets.
Then, as doubts started to emerge about agrofuels and oil prices fell, investors fled speculative markets in the United States and prices plummeted. This has not helped farmers or consumers.
Ambitious U.S. incentives and targets for agrofuel production have created real problems for food production, land rights and the environment in many countries. These policies were set in place under the Bush Administration.
“President-elect Obama has indicated that he wants to re-engage with the world on more positive terms,” said Karen Hansen-Kuhn, ActionAid International USA’s director of policy. “He has an opportunity to set things right by suspending the targets and developing new policies that balance the need for energy supplies and the right to food.”
In Senegal, where riots broke out earlier in the year because of rising food prices, the government has launched an ambitious plan to expand agrofuel production - creating new pressures on so-called “marginal” lands.
In the Bignona area, the Forestry Department estimates that clearing forests to create plots of jatropha (a drought resistant, high-yielding oil crop) could result in a 68 percent reduction in income sources for rural populations.
Women are being hit especially hard by such changes as they gather firewood, nuts and other forest products to supplement their households’ incomes and nutritional needs.
“The rush to expand agrofuel production could undermine national food security,” said Fatou Mbaye, ActionAid Senegal. “Senegal currently depends on imports for more than 60 percent of its food needs. Consultations between the government and foreign investors who are interested in agrofuel production should also include representatives of local communities.”
