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No to the Agrofuels craze! |
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New from GRAIN - June 2007 - GRAIN has just published a special issue of Seedling which focuses on biofuels or as some call grofuels - over 30,000 words of
in-depth analysis from around the world.
http://www.grain.org/nfg/?id=502
In the process of gathering material from colleagues and social movements
around the world, we have discovered that the stampede into agrofuels is
causing enormous environmental and social damage, much more than we realised earlier. Precious ecosystems are being destroyed and hundreds of thousands of indigenous and peasant communities are being thrown off their land.Worse lies ahead: the Indian government is committed to planting 14 million hectares of land with jatropha (an exotic bush from which biodiesel can be manufactured), the Inter-American Development Bank says that Brazil has 120 million hectares available for biofuels, and lobbyists in Europe are speaking of almost 400 million hectares being available for biofuels in 15 African countries. We are talking about expropriation on an unprecedented
scale.
We believe that the prefix bio, which comes from the Greek word for 'life',
is entirely inappropriate for such anti-life devastation. So, following the
lead of non-governmental organisations and social movements in Latin
America, we do not talk about biofuels and green energy. Agrofuels is a much
better term, we believe, to express what is really happening: agribusiness
producing fuel from plants as another commodity to in a wasteful,
destructive and unjust global economy.
In this special issue of Seedling, launched today, we zoom in on the
situation in different parts of the world: Latin America, Asia and Africa.
We analyse what is happening and talk to the people involved. The conclusion
is pretty much the same across the board: the push for agrofuels amounts to
nothing less than the re-introduction and re-enforcement of the old colonial
plantation economy, redesigned to function under the rules of the modern
neoliberal, globalised world. Indigenous farming systems, local communities
and the biodiversity they manage have to give way to provide for the
increased fuel needs of the modern world.
One of the main justifications for the large-scale cultivation of agrofuels
is the need to combat climate change, but the figures make a mockery of this
claim. According to the US government, global energy consumption is set to
increase 71 per cent from 2003 to 2030, and most of that will come from
burning more oil, coal and natural gas. By the end of this period, all
renewable energy (including agrofuels) will only make up 9 per cent of
global energy consumption. It is a dangerous self-delusion to argue that
agrofuels can play a significant role in combating global warming.
As is spelt out in this special edition, the wide-scale cultivation of
agrofuels will actually make things worse in many parts of the world,
notably South-east Asia and the Amazon basin where the drying of peat lands
and the felling of tropical forest will release far more carbon dioxide into
the atmosphere than will be saved by using agrofuels.
One of the main causes of global warming is agro-industrial farming itself,
and the global food system associated with it. Although it is scarcely ever
mentioned, farming is responsible for 14 per cent of greenhouse gas
emissions. Within farming, the largest single cause is the use of chemical
fertilisers, which introduce a huge amount of nitrogen into the soil, and
nitrous oxide into the air. Changing land use (mainly deforestation and thus
linked to the expansion of crop monoculture) is responsible for another 18
per cent. And a large part of global transport, which is responsible for a
further 14 per cent of emissions, stems from the way in which the
agro-industrial complex moves large quantities of food from one continent to
anther.
It is abundantly clear that we can only halt climate change by challenging
the absurdity and the waste of the globalised food system as organised by
the transnational corporations. Far from contributing to the solution,
biofuels will only make a bad situation worse. GRAIN believes it is time to
declare unambiguously 'No to the agrofuels craze!'
Agrofuels resource page: http://www.grain.org/go/agrofuels
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SPECIAL ISSUE OF SEEDLING (JULY 2007)
http://www.grain.org/seedling/?type=68
Download the entire Seedling issue in PDF format, or you can download
individual articles below. (Note: Articles are only currently available in
PDF format - we hope to have HTML versions of these articles in mid-July).
SEEDLING EDITORIAL
http://www.grain.org/seedling/?id=476
INTRODUCTORY ARTICLE
http://www.grain.org/seedling/?id=477
An introductory article that, among other things, looks at the mind-boggling
numbers that are being bandied around: the Indian government is talking of
planting 14 million hectares of land with jatropha; the Inter-American
Development Bank says that Brazil has 120 million hectares that could be
cultivated with agrofuel crops; and an agrofuel lobby is speaking of 379
million hectares being available in 15 African countries.
CORPORATE POWER AND THE EXPANSION OF AGRIBUSINESS
http://www.grain.org/seedling/?id=478
A detailed look at the way agrofuels is restructuring agribusiness, with the
emergence of new powerful corporate alliances across the globe. Agrofuels
are deepening the alliances between transnational capital and local landed
elites, with profound consequences for struggles over land and local food
production.
AGROFUELS IN AFRICA
http://www.grain.org/seedling/?id=481
Foreign diplomats and businessmen are pouring in to secure reliable supply
chains of agrofuels. Not only the old colonial powers but new emerging
countries, particularly Brazil and China, are scouring the region for
investment deals. There is talk of Southern Africa becoming 'the Middle East
of agrofuels'. A report from Uganda where popular movements have forced the
government to suspend two big agrofuel projects.
AGROFUELS IN ASIA
http://www.grain.org/seedling/?id=479
In no other region in the world is the absurdity of the frenzied rush into
agrofuels more blatant than in South-east Asia, particularly in Indonesia
and Malaysia. With funding under the terms of the Kyoto Protocol, peat lands
are being destroyed (with the emission of billions of tonnes of carbon) to
plant palms to produce oil for biodiesel. A report from Indonesia where the
population is protesting over the surge in cooking oil prices because so
much palm oil is being exported.
AGROFUELS IN LATIN AMERICA
http://www.grain.org/seedling/?id=482
A mosaic of interviews with leaders of social and popular movements, who
analyse what is happening on their countries and describe their strategies
for confronting agrofuels. A look at the emergence of large-scale biodiesel
production in Latin America (particularly in the Amazon, where soya
cultivation for the production of soya oil for biodiesel is intensifying
forest destruction).
FURTHER READING
http://www.grain.org/seedling/?id=483
The volume of recent articles, papers and other materials on agrofuels can be
overwhelming. Below we list some that we found particularly useful when
preparing this Seedling.
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