1. Sustainability and Agrofuels what does it really mean?
Helena Paul EcoNexus
International Workshop on
Global Agrofuels: Sustaining What Development?
30 August – 3 September 2009 Maputo Mozambique

3. EU: agrofuels promised as a means to:
Reduce GHG emissions
Develop and modernise agriculture
Provide better returns to desperate EU farmers
Regenerate declining rural areas
Provide jobs and export earnings
Regenerate soils and degraded land with “advanced” agrofuels

4. What is the context of EU agrofuels promotion?
EU model of development built on fossil oil
Agrofuels as a means to maintain the model, not to change it
Thus
satisfying industrial lobbies
not challenging the public love of the car
while (hopefully) reducing greenhouse gas emissions

5. EU agrofuels 2020 projection
10% per EU state minimum for transport
This could require 16-31Mha of EU land!
Total EU arable land: 88 Mha
For 10% of transport, which is around 25% of EU total energy consumption, we would need 18-35% EU arable land!
Conclusion:
this would compete with EU food production
increasing from 10% would mean using even more EU land for agrofuels
clearly EU must import from the global south!

6. Agrofuel futures in the EU
Second generation agrofuels, using the whole plant or tree
Promised as a solution to all the problems of the first generation
Leading to
Replacement of all products derived from fossil oil with products from biomass
The integrated biorefinery and
The bioeconomy, linking biotech oil, power, automotive, timber and paper industries

7. Sustainability criteria for agrofuels in the EU
To reassure politicians and public with doubts about agrofuels
Environmental criteria to prevent destruction of forests, biodiversity, land with high carbon stocks, wetlands and peatlands; promote use of “degraded” land
Social criteria to seek compliance with ILO conventions - if countries have signed them

8. Monitoring and compliance rules for criteria
Economic operators should be able to show criteria have been fulfilled
Member states to ensure that this does not place an “undue burden” on industry
Since fuels will be mixed, a “mass balance” system is used to calculate average sustainability of the mixture
Main punishment is not being allowed to count your fuels towards the target

9. What is sustainability? Some definitions
"Meeting the needs of the present generation without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs."
able to endure over time
renew itself
and maintain processes into the future

10. We are told that agrofuels are sustainable
Fossil oil will finally run out,
But plants and trees keep growing - an endlessly renewable resource
What are we really sustaining here?
Perpetuating the internal combustion engine
Keeping cars on the road
Sustaining the western development model

11. Western development model
Based on high energy intensity, using energy dense fossil oil
Can/should the rest of the world follow the same path in the future?
Is it just to deny them what the west has enjoyed?
Are peak oil/climate collapse inevitable?
Can/should we develop an alternative to fossil oil?
Should we change the model?
If so, how?

12. If not this model, then what?
What kind of development do we want?
What kind of development would be truly sustainable?
Who will decide and how?
How do we get there from here?
Who will it belong to?

13. Development – two basic models
Imposed from outside, eg: via investment for export trade
Market driven, often corporate dependent
Products primarily for export
Developed from inside, from the ground up
This needs time and broad public discussion
Protection from outside interference and pressure
May require outside assistance, but on the terms of those who have developed it

14. What part will agrofuels play in our energy futures?
How important will agrofuels be:
for agriculture?
for energy?
Will they mainly be produced:
For export?
For internal use?

15. Can agrofuels sometimes play a role in sustainable development?
where there is no electricity grid
where there are few roads and little infrastructure
when produced by communities for their own use and limited sales
without the intervention of large corporations
What would this look like?

16. Agrofuels and colonisers old and new
EU and EU corporations looking for agrofuel production in Africa
Land-grabbing by corporations and countries seeking investment opportunities for profit and food/agrofuel security
Brazil exporting sugar ethanol production methodologies worldwide including to Mozambique
China investing in Africa and South America – wants animal feed, iron, timber ….and agrofuel

17. Last word from Olivier De Schutter, the United Nations special rapporteur on the right to food
“There still is a vast market for first-generation agrofuels”
Existing incentives for biofuels in the United States and European Union remain a cause for grave concern
Biofuels remain an important driver behind big land acquisitions and land leases in poor countries that jeopardize local inhabitants’ food security.
Safeguards adopted by the European Union in 2008 “absolutely insufficient to monitor to the impacts on the countries concerned by shifts in land use for agrofuels production.”
Next generation fuels “are too distant for the moment to say that we can continue to insist on the use of agrofuels for transport.”
June 12, 2009, 10:24 am Biofuels and ‘Land Grabs’ in Poor Nations by James Kanter AFP/Getty