Brazil's Agrofuel Push in Sao Paulo I

Lula's Ethanol Show

17 November 2008, Sao Paulo 

The Hyatt hotel and conference center in the city of Sao Paulo is the heavily guarded scene of the International Biofuels Conference, Biofuels as a driving force of sustainable development. What was supposed to be President Lula's ethanol feast, has turned out a less high profile event now that George W. Bush cancelled his participation. Lula, in turn, also declined to show up for the opening speech and sent his Minister Dilma Rousseff to replace him. Nevertheless, European Energy Commissioner Piebalgs, and an EC delegation around him, is still going to attend. According to inside sources, the event is really not more than propaganda, with the Brazilian delegates refusing any real debate on 'sustainability' issues. And not only them.

The Paraguayan delegate's objective is to get commitments from his Brazilian counterparts to act on the bilateral Memorandum of Understanding, and come up with something to offer. Present is also the Finnish public private research consortium on forestry, and use of cellulose for second generation agrofuels. The Dutch government were told that the Brazilian government was too busy to have a meeting on the Dutch-Brazil bilateral Memorandum of Understanding, but it is more likely that the Dutch proposal to lower the current indicative agrofuel target for 2010, bothered them deeply.

On Monday, energy security was the main theme. Not coincidentally, as it's a public secret that not climate change nor development are the drivers for the agrofuel push. As Paul Robers, energy expert (US), stated, the main driver for agrofuels is the high price of oil, and the fact that the US and EU wish to get rid of their dependency on the Middle East for liquid fuels. He emphasised once more the convenience of agrofuels being a liquid fuel, therefore "not demanding any change of behaviour from the part of the consumer." Another participant to this debate was Ibrahim Assane Mayaki (Sudan), "CEO from NGO HUBrural" (sic).

The Rural Hub, with a closer look, itself seems to have an equally disturbed definition of 'civil society organisation', and present the West African Network of Chambers of Agriculture (RECAO) and the Africa Agro Export Association (AAFEX) as such in their network. It was therefore not surprising to hear Mr Mayaki talk about the 'development' opportunity of large scale agrofuel production, although some on the panel wondered why African countries would not produce to meet internal demand first. Alan Kardec Pinto, Petrobrás' Biofuel president expanded on the 'trilateral partnerships' between EU countries, Brazil and Africa that have now become en vogue (see also: Cornering the market in agrofuels: Brazil’s bid to dominate the EU, Kim Bizzarri, Corporate Europe Observatory, November 2008), with state enterprise EMBRAPA as special agent, having set up shop in Ghana for example.

In another part of town, in the teachers' syndicate building at Praza Republica, an International Seminar is held "Agrofuels as obstacle to food and energy sovereignty", called for by Brazilian organisations and social movements, and supported by a range of organisations internationally. Here, the interrelations between the food, energy and financial crisis are exposed, and its implications for for example workers discussed. On Wednesday, a declaration from this forum will be read inside the official conference. On Thursday, MST and other social movements and organisations, have mobilised for a protest against the conference. For information on the official conference: www.biofuels2008.mre.gov.br