The EU's agrofuel folly: The come back of the biotech industry
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Written by Corporate Europe Observatory
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Tuesday, 12 June 2007
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 The main European biotech lobby group, EuropaBio, was a member of BIOFRAC and is also an active member of the EBFTP. As EuropaBio's secretary general Johan Vanhemelrijck explains "We have worked hard to establish excellent working relations with the Commission and our close involvement with the new Biofuels Technology Platform is one of the fruits of this."[25]
The biotech industry hopes to overcome the fierce public resistance to GM crops, by developing 'improved' crops for agrofuel production. Growing public concern for climate change and the green label that still attaches itself to agrofuel development could offer the biotech 'fix' an opportunity for more PR success that in the past. Genetically engineered crops that are rejected for food, may be more publicly acceptable if they are providing fuel for passenger cars in a way that is promoted as more 'climate friendly'. Messaging from EuropaBio reflects this new discourse. They talk about how biotechnology is 'climate friendly', and more than this it will drive expansion of the global economy, increase wealth while reducing humankind's environmental footprint, reduce dependence on oil imports and provide an income stream for farmers. Their new buzzword is the 'bio-based economy', "a term which encapsulates our vision of a future society no longer wholly dependent on fossil fuels for energy and industrial raw materials... The whole world is now in transition from the Age of Chemistry to the Age of Biotechnology". [26]
Yet, the negative impacts already associated with large-scale monoculture containing genetically engineered crops will be exacerbated by the large expansion of agrofuels. GM contamination is likely to increase and become more complex, when food crops are engineered with traits designed for non-food purposes. [27] Currently, GM crops are mainly for animal feed, and the same corporations that control these crops and inputs for animal feed are the ones set to benefit from their use for agrofuels.
According to Berkeley professor Miguel Altieri and Food First executive director Eric Holt-Gimenez, the agrofuel agenda offers biotech companies like Monsanto "the opportunity to irreversibly convert agriculture to genetically engineered crops. Presently 52% of corn, 89% of soy and 50% of canola in the US is genetically modified (GM)." The authors argue that "the expansion of corn genetically tailored for special ethanol processing plants will remove all practical barriers to the permanent contamination of all non-GMO crops." [28]
In the EU consumer resistance has to a large extent kept GM crops out. With agrofuels, the biotech industry has a chance to gain access by the back door, presenting GM crops as energy crops, not food crops. However, the risks of contamination to non-GM crops remain. For example, Syngenta has applied in Europe for authorisation to import a type of GM maize, named Event 3272, specifically intended for ethanol agrofuels. This maize can help convert itself into ethanol by growing a particular enzyme (which breaks starch into simpler molecules of carbohydrate easing the transformation into ethanol). However, it also contains a marker gene derived from E coli. "Agrofuels: Towards a Reality Check in nine key areas", a recent paper produced by several organisations campaigning on agrofuels, explains how applications for import of this GM maize in the EU and South Africa show that it is expected to contaminate both food and animal feed, as Syngenta has applied for authorisation for both. [29]
Agrofuels are already enhancing the profits of the biotech industry, and the race is on for new GM energy crops. DuPont indicates annual revenues from the global agrofuel markets, largely from agricultural inputs to fuel ethanol of about US$300 million. [30] Last February the company announced a US$100 million reinvestment plan to shorten the time to access the market for new seed products for Pioneer, DuPont's subsidiary. According to Bill Niebur, Vice President for genetics research and development, "Demand for ethanol means that the race is on to rapidly ramp up grain yields." [31] Monsanto is also in the race. The world's largest developer of genetically modified seeds announced recently record profits because of growing ethanol demand. [32] Monsanto will boost seed production capacity this year, planning to spend US$500 million to meet rising corn-seed demand. The biotech industry is also investing heavily in second generation agrofuels, designing special traits for feedstock and investing in the processes to convert feedstock into fuels, using for example, enzymes.
Second generation agrofuels, the blanket solution?
Both industry and governments are responding to growing concerns about the large expansion of agrofuels by advocating second-generation agrofuels. Using the whole plant instead of isolated parts, it is claimed can achieve a better CO2 performance and reduce production costs. Furthermore, there is advantage because a wider range of feedstocks can be used, such as trees, plant waste, grass or straw. So for example, using trees instead of food crops is offered as an opportunity to avoid agrofuel's competition with food supplies. Yet, this approach is certainly not without problems. For example, large tree plantations will still compete with food in terms of land and water use. An additional problem of using whole plants is that more is being taken out of the soil as reduced organic matter remains, and this has a negative impact on ecosystems. More fundamentally, irrespective of the pros and cons and risks of individual agrofuels the main problem will still be the scale needed to meet governments' targets. There is no way of avoiding the fact that this means large monoculture plantations, in most cases controlled by big agribusiness firms and wealthy land owners, so is accompanied by the predictable negative environmental and social costs that this way of organising agricultural production brings.
These second generation agrofuels are not yet commercially viable, and remains uncertain as to whether they ever will be. Yet, despite the lack of evidence of their role as a solution to climate change and no impact assessment of the risks involved, governments are funding their development with public money and putting them at the core of their agrofuel policies. The case being made for the development of second generation agrofuels in terms of the solutions they will bring in the medium-long term, in part offers an excuse for the unabated present-day expansion of existing agrofuels. This is in the face of growing evidence of their negative consequences. Activist and writer George Monbiot puts it clearly: "It used to be a matter of good intentions gone awry. Now it is plain fraud. The governments using biofuels to tackle global warming know that it causes more harm than good. But they plough on regardless." [33] The reality is that the EU's agrofuel folly, with its corporate bias, will do nothing to stop climate change and will have a severe impact on the global South. "While Europeans maintain their lifestyle based on automobile culture, the population of Southern countries will have less and less land for food crops and will loose its food sovereignty" [34] warned Latin American networks of civil society groups when they asked the EU not to adopt agrofuels mandatory targets.
In public-policy terms, it seems foolish to set targets for agrofuels, as the EU has done, given the lack of risk assessment for second generation agrofuels and the negative consequences associated with any large-scale promotion of existing agrofuels. This report has shown both the mechanisms behind existing EU policies and the motivations of key corporate players. The EU's choice for agrofuels has been largely driven by industries that will directly benefit from the further development and large-scale use of agrofuels.
This biased policy-making process will bring high costs to other stakeholders, both inside and outside the EU. There is a lot of talk about some type of certification scheme to ensure that only sustainable agrofuels or raw materials are imported into the EU or can enjoy subsidies and other incentives. However, certification can simply not address the problem of displacement, the fact that 'sustainable' production will displace 'unsustainable' production (not only of crops for agrofuels but also of those same crops for other uses such as animal feed and paper) somewhere else, therefore merely shifting the problem to another place. If the EU is genuinely interested in averting climate change then policies need to reflect opportunities for fundamental change focusing on reducing energy consumption and the EU's global ecological and social footprint. In the meanwhile the only sensible thing would be to establish a moratorium on all EU agrofuel targets.
Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO)
Notes:
25. EuropaBio Press release, Biotech industry offers enthusiastic, active support for new EU biofuels initiative, Brussels, 8 June 2006.
26. From the European bio-based economy website (www.bio-economy.net) a joint initiative of EuropaBio and ESAB. Accessed 29 May 2007.
27. Agrofuels: Towards a Reality Check in nine key areas", Paper to the Delegations of the Convention on Biological Diversity, published for the SBSTTA meeting, Paris 2-6 July 2007. Published by: Biofuelwatch, Carbon Trade Watch / Transnational Institute, Corporate Europe Observatory, Econexus, Ecoropa, Grupo de Reflexion Rural, Munlochy Vigil, NOAH (Friends of the Earth Denmark), Rettet Den Regenwald, Watch Indonesia. With contributions from Ecologistas en Accion, Global Forest Coalition, June 2007
28. News Analysis: UC's Biotech Benefactors, by Miguel Altieri and Eric Holtz-Gimenez, Berkeley Daily Planet, 6 February 2007.
29. "Agrofuels: Towards a Reality Check in nine key areas", Paper to the Delegations of the Convention on Biological Diversity, published for the SBSTTA meeting, Paris 2-6 July 2007. Published by: Biofuelwatch, Carbon Trade Watch / Transnational Institute, Corporate Europe Observatory, Econexus, Ecoropa, Grupo de Reflexion Rural, Munlochy Vigil, NOAH (Friends of the Earth Denmark), Rettet Den Regenwald, Watch Indonesia. With contributions from Ecologistas en Accion, Global Forest Coalition, June 2007
30. DuPont does the DNA dance, Industry Week, John Teresko, 1 April 2007.
31. DuPont sees key GMO role in ethanol corn challenge, Reuters, 9 February 2007.
32. Monsanto Net Rises 23% on Corn Seeds; Forecast Raised, By Jack Kaskey, 4 April 2007, Bloomberg.
33. If we want to save the planet, we need a five-year freeze on biofuels, George Monbiot, The Guardian, 27 March 2007.
34. We want food sovereignty, not biofuels, open letter to the European Parliament, the European Commission, the governments and citizens of the European Union, January 2007, by Latin American Networks.
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Non ce n'est pas une affiche de campagne en Turquie, mais bien celle du parti socialiste autrichien (SPÖ) pour les élections d'octobre prochain à Vienne. Après les affiches de campagne de Strache qui plaide pour le " pur sang viennois" c'est la course au populisme?
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