Sustainability • Volume 8 • Number 11 • 13th June 2008
Biofuels in the Spotlight at Global Food Summit
A major international conference recently concluded with a call to address the complex issues underlying the current food crisis. Among the issues addressed — and left unresolved — was the contribution of biofuels production to the problem.
Heads of state, ministers and other high-level officials from 181 countries attended a summit on climate change, energy and food in Rome on 3-5 June. The UN Food and Agricultural Organisation (FAO) ‘High-Level Conference on World Food Security: the Challenges of Climate Change and Bioenergy’ was a culmination of months of expert-level meetings that assessed the complex causes and effects of the recent rise in food prices. A Declaration on World Food Security was issued at the conclusion of the meeting, committing the attendees to “eliminating hunger and securing food for all.” It included provisions on short and long-term measures to address the causes and effects of the recent spike in food prices.
Industry interests represented in Rome
Key biofuels stakeholders started preparing the ground for a battle on the topic in advance of the Food Summit. A number of developed countries, including the US, Canada and several European countries — also top donors to the FAO and World Food Programme — have committed themselves to the use of biofuels, and have active stakeholders within their farming communities and biofuel industries.
Preparing for the summit, industry representatives in the US, Canada and Europe sent a letter to the attendees, downplaying the negative impact of biofuels on food prices. According to the letter, “It would be highly precipitous…for the United Nations or other international bodies to single out biofuels as the major cause for escalating food prices and take actions that might lead to even higher food prices.”
A number of studies have provided a range of estimates of the actual impact of biofuels policies on food prices, with the FAO and the Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) attributing between 20-60 percent of the rise in food prices to biofuels. The Washington-based International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) provided an estimate of 30 percent.
The FAO/OECD report further suggested that leaders rethink biofuel policy, called the economic, environmental and energy benefits of current generation biofuels “at best modest and sometimes even negative.”
Diouf questions use of biofuels
Early on at the summit, FAO Director-General Jacques Diouf honed in on biofuels subsidies, saying that “Nobody understands [why] $11-12bn of subsidies in 2006 and protective tariff policies [should be used to] divert 100m tonnes of cereals from human consumption, mostly to satisfy a thirst for fuel for vehicles.”
During the three-day meeting, biofuels continued to be one of the most contentious issues.
US Agriculture Secretary Ed Schafer played an active role as a proponent of biofuels, defending the US corn-based ethanol industry. “It’s not a question of choosing between food and fuel. The world has no shortage of agricultural land to produce either, but it has been short of agricultural investment for a long time,” he said. In contrast to estimates provided by FAO, the OECD and IFPRI, Schafer stated that the biofuels boom has only had an impact amounting to 2-3 percent of the increase in food prices.
The summit also saw squabbling between different biofuels producers. Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva took aim at the US, saying that the country’s subsidies and tariff barriers are designed to keep out Brazilian sugar-cane ethanol. He dismissed charges that biofuel production was responsible for the current food crisis and supported sustainable biofuel production, noting the many benefits of cane-based ethanol. Brazilian ethanol does not depend on subsidies in order to be viable, something most developed-country biofuels do.
However, a number of developing countries, Venezuela and Egypt among them, proposed strong language for the final declaration, opposing the diversion of food crops for the production of biofuels.
Indian Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar said “if we decided to convert all of the world’s grain into motor fuel we will still need to use lots of oil and we would not be having anything to eat.” He added that “conversions of food grain and oil seeds for producing bio-fuel, prima facie, appears to be fraught with food security concerns as is evident already.”
Development groups such as Oxfam and ActionAid also spoke out against biofuels. Rob Bailey, a biofuels expert at Oxfam, stressed the necessity of focusing on biofuels policy and subsidies as an area of intervention in the food crises. “We can’t control the weather, we can’t control the growth of demand in China, we can’t control the oil price but we can control biofuels policy, because it’s politically created in the first place,” he said. He noted that cane-based ethanol posed less of a threat as compared to corn-based biofuels.
Participants decide to study biofuel impacts
In the end, the summit agreed on a watered-down declaration on biofuels, recognising both “challenges and opportunities posed by biofuels, in view of the world’s food security, energy and sustainable development needs.” In the declaration, the conference called for in-depth study “to ensure that production and use of biofuels is sustainable.” The attendees also said they would “foster a coherent, effective and results-oriented international dialogue on biofuels in the context of food security and sustainable development needs.”
The renewable fuels associations of the US, Canada, with the European Bioethanol Fuel Association welcomed the “thoughtful approach” the declaration took. “We welcome today’s UN FAO proposal to undertake further study of biofuels in agriculture. We are confident it will underscore the valuable contribution biofuels can make to ease the energy and agriculture challenges confronting all nations,” they said in their statement.
Other developments: short and long-term action
In addition to the biofuel debate, the Food Summit addressed a number of crucial issues, including the immediate need for funding to alleviate the food crises. Diouf appealed to the international community to commit “US$30 billion a year to enable 862 million hungry people to enjoy the most fundamental of human rights: the right to food and thus the right to life.” At the summit, participants pledged US$6.8 billion towards a fund to address hunger and poverty.
The declaration of the summit also called for increased resources for UN agencies, cooperation between international and national food security actors, and food assistance that is cognisant of a “continuum from urgent to longer term assistance.”
After addressing the urgent need for relief, the declaration emphasised the need for an appropriate set of policies that support agricultural trade and production. Global market integration, reduced barriers to trade and capacity building through improved agricultural inputs were particular areas of emphasis.
The Doha round of trade negotiations was explicitly mentioned. WTO Members reiterated “their willingness to reach comprehensive and ambitious results conducive to improving food security in developing countries.”
The summit declaration also set out a series of longer-term measures and objectives to reduce hunger, decrease the vulnerability to shocks of the food system, and address the challenges of climate change.
Additional resources
For a full report on the Summit, see Bridges Weekly at http://www.ictsd.org/weekly/08-06-11/story2.htm.
World Declaration on Food Security is available at http://www.fao.org/fileadmin/user_upload/foodclimate/HLCdocs/declaration-E.pdf.
For daily reports and a summary of the World Food Summit by IISD’s Earth Negotiations Bulletin, visit http://www.iisd.ca/ymb/wfs/.
ICTSD reporting; “Food-summit draft rejects biofuels control,” GLOBE AND MAIL, 5 June 2008; “World’s farmers by-passed at UN food crisis summit: IFAP,” AFP, 9 June 2008; “Africa: Food Summit Calls for More Investment in Agriculture,” GHANAIAN CHRONICLE, 10 June 2008; “Biofuel industries pleased by U.N. summit resolution,” REUTERS, 5 June 2008; “Rome food summit calls for in-depth study on bio-fuels,” PRESS TRUST INDIA, 6 June 2008.