Biofuels defended
Fears that the manufacture of biofuels are pushing up commodity prices are unfounded, according to The Home Grown Cereals Authority (HGCA).
In its report, Making Sense of Biofuels, the HGCA insisted biofuels were a minor contributor to rising raw materials prices and were not the ecological and environmental disaster many lobbyists have claimed.
Crop marketing director Alastair Dickie said: “Some of the publicity surrounding biofuels in recent months seems to suggest that biofuels will do more harm than good, and that we should wait for the advent of second generation biofuels. Clearly, any new industry will have its problems, but we are not being told the whole story at the moment. We do have enough land to supply first-generation biofuels to meet the targets set in Europe, and biofuels can deliver significant carbon savings.
“However, to ensure that we do this, we have to deliver biofuels from sustainable sources. We also have to bear in mind that second-generation biofuels are still some way from being commercially viable. In order to have infra-structure and distribution for them when they arrive, we need to develop a biofuels industry now based on existing technology.”
A HGCA spokeswoman added: “The ex-farm price of cereals is an extremely small percentage of retail product prices and, as such, is highly unlikely to lead to significant increases to consumers.”
The report was designed to counter some of the misinformation circulating about the impact of biofuels, said the HGCA. “The market will respond to the requirement for additional crops not just by using more land, but by increasing productivity. Work is already underway to produce wheat varieties optimised for biofuel production and grown in a more environmentally friendly way.”
Despite claims by manufacturers such as Nestlé that switching agricultural land to biofuel production was “economically and ecologically indefensible”, biofuels were able to deliver significant reductions in energy use and greenhouse gas emissions, claimed the HGCA. “Recent research shows that biodiesel can deliver energy savings of up to 97% and greenhouse gas savings of up to 94%,” it added.
The report was published as Deutsche Bank analyst John Parker warned that the growth of biofuels, coupled with a surge in demand for raw materials from China and India, were causing “long-term adverse shifts in commodities prices”
Cargill’s new chief executive, Gregory Page, also warned of food shortages as crops were diverted into fuel production and the allocation of land was “distorted”
