The frontal attack on biofuels by some environmentalists and Greens in the European Parliament (see this column in bulletin 9414) has received political support of some substance, signed personally as it was by Fidel Castro. The “lider maximo” aggressively criticised the strategic agreement signed in March by the presidents of the United States and Brazil (on bioethanol and other biofuels), describing the project to transform food products - sugar cane, maize, rape, palm oil etc. - into fuel as “diabolic”, because it could put the lives of 3.5 billion people in danger and could compromise the Earth's biological balance through the destruction of tropical forests and the waste of drinking water.
The European projects are environmentally sound. It is not European projects that threaten to cause such catastrophes. Europe is actively preparing second generation biofuels from biomass (waste from agricultural crops, straw, scraps of wood etc.). In our countries, beetroot, maize and soya too (if EU farmers were allowed to grow it in reasonably viable conditions) will continue to be used mainly for foodstuffs. It is not a reasonable and controlled biofuel production that threatens the biodiversity, territorial balance, traditions and countryside in our lands, but the destruction of the agricultural activity itself, which would result from opening Europe to competition from the world over, including from counties which have no respect for the health standards that are compulsory in the EU or essential environmental precautionary measures.
Of course, precautionary measures in biofuel production are needed in the EU itself: restrictions should be imposed on the use of fertilisers and pesticides, and on extending usable land; we must ensure that second generation biofuels are developed quickly enough to be useful and that they lead to a reduction in CO² emissions; imports will have to be monitored, with production conditions in exporting third countries checked. Moreover, the two non-governmental organisations, which raised the alarm at the European biofuel conference in Madrid two weeks ago, clearly warned of the threats to tropical rainforests, the climate and food safety because of the expansion of intensive single crop farming on vulnerable and environmentally fragile areas. Specific mention was made of Amazonia, Indonesia and Malaysia. The study by Mark Jacobson of the University of Stanford (California) refers explicitly to the effects of ethanol (distilled alcohol from plants not specifically grown for the purpose), that is, first generation biofuels.
Unreasonable opposition. It is true that the Madrid meeting also warned against the dangers of uncontrolled expansion of biofuel crops (for example, rape in France), because it could lead to extensive use of fertilisers and pesticides and excessive irrigation. However, estimates in Madrid of the total agricultural area needed in the EU to reach the targets set by heads of state and government were reassuring (if controlled imports from third countries are taken into account). Second generation biofuels should begin to be seen on the market between 2012 and 2020, thus within an appropriate timespan. I believe that attempts to destroy European ambitions on biofuels are unreasonable.
Fidel Castro's real concerns. There is every reason to believe that Fidel Castro's outburst was not motivated by humanitarian or environmental concerns, but came rather for strategic and political reasons: to support the oil interests of his ally Hugo Chavez, the president of Venezuela (who had launched a project for a huge oil/gas pipeline across Latin America, thus allowing his country to supply Brazil, Argentina, Chile and others with oils and gas), and those of Cuba itself, which could become a major oil producer if the reserves found in its territorial waters prove to be large.
Let us not forget that the fever for oil can kill agriculture. Nigeria used to be an exporter of food products which, today, it has to import to feed its 135 million inhabitants. It has become Africa's largest oil producer and one of the world's biggest, but its cereal and rice production has collapsed, the land is covered by a complex spider's web of 5,000 km of pipelines. The country lives from oil activities, which only employ a limited number of its people. The result is corruption, conflict, disorder and the destruction of a formerly efficient agricultural sector.
(F.R.)