Bridges Trade BioRes • Volume 7 • Number 13 • 6th July 2007

High-Level Meeting Focuses on Biofuel Sustainability, Standards

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The rapid expansion of biofuels use and the development of an international biofuels market can bring about benefits, but also lead to new problems unless checks and balances are put in place, participants at a 5-6 July conference in Brussels heard.

High-level speakers, such as Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, and Commission President José Manuel Barroso addressed the development of international trade in biofuels, as well as related environmental and developmental issues.

In terms of trade, EU Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson said “Europe should be open to accepting that we will import a large part of our biofuel resources. We cannot contemplate, in my view, favouring EU production of biofuels with a weak carbon performance if we can import cheaper, cleaner biofuels.”

Barroso stressed the need for “setting up a rigorous sustainability mechanism to underpin a new market for these products.”

Brazil — an producer of sugar-based ethanol that minimises carbon emissions — faces a 70 percent import tariff. While some European countries, such as Sweden, are keen to see that tariff slashed, others are dominated by strong farming constituencies that see biofuels as the new frontier of farming. France, for example, is keen to promote homegrown biofuels. In addition, environmental groups that initially supported the EU biofuels target of a ten percent blend by 2020 are now calling for a strong verification system to ensure that any biofuels used have been sustainably produced and deliver real climate benefits.

The European Bio-ethanol Fuel Association (e-Bio) said that European producers already were responding to the ten-percent target through massive investment. However, their industry would not remain viable if the European market were to open up to large-scale imports. The group did support imports from developing countries, excluding middle-income countries such as Brazil. E-Bio also indicated that the US applies a 54 cent per gallon tariff on imports from countries such as Brazil — a tariff that will remain in place at least until 2009. Accordingly, it would not be fair if the EU alone would face tariff reduction.

Lula, for his part, stressed that “We cannot send out contradictory signals. The very governments who reiterate their commitment to sustainable development, to the reduction of greenhouse gases, cannot then turn around and create obstacles to turning biofuels into international commodities.”

Additional information

Conference homepage http://ec.europa.eu/external_relations/energy/biofuels/index.htm

BioRes articles on biofuels are available at http://www.trade-environment.org/page/ictsd/news/cc.htm#biofuels

“EU Seeks Biofuel Imports, Environment Standards Too,” REUTERS, 6 July 2007; “Europe, Brazil Pledge Sustainable Biofuels Development,” ENS, 5 July 2007; “EU urged to monitor biofuel boom,” BBC, 5 July 2007.