Moreno claimed that it has failed in many parts of the world, because governments tend to ensure their national profits and balance sheets rather than the food security of their people and sovereignty of their nations.
Moreno also said that the problem with bio-ethanol is not only economic and technical, but essentially political. “Bio-ethanol is major decision, a flagship program that has not gone through democratic consultation, and has not considered critical issues such as food security, other renewable energy development, and sovereignty of the people.”
Though Brazil is a unique country, it experiences in bio-ethanol could also happen in Asian countries like Philippines, she said.
The spiraling cost of fossil fuel and the seemingly irreversible environmental damage wrought by global warming has triggered a mad scramble for clean energy the world over. Among the alternatives that caught the fancy of Philippine government officials is Biofuel. Thus, the Philippine Biofuel Law, R.A. 9367, was enacted in 2006.
Even before the passage of the Biofuel Law, various initiatives were undertaken by government and business leaders in Negros Occidental to address the impending energy crisis, to fully comply with the 2010 target of the World Trade Organization (WTO), and to maximize the business opportunities that the production of Biofuel offers. Among the plans hatched by the provincial leaders is the propagation of Jatropha for Biodiesel production and conversion of sugar to ethanol.
“You need not wait for the total devastation of Brazil to wake up one day that the bio-ethanol program is hazardous to our agriculture and food security; you must not repeat the Brazil experience,” Moreno urged the Filipinos.
Moreno is a member of the American Society of Social Science Organization’s political ecology group. She works on social and environmental impacts of biotechnology and agribusiness expansion in Brazil and Latin America and is a member of the Political Ecology working group of the Latin America Council of Social Sciences, CLACSO.
She is also a lawyer and holds a post-graduate degree in Development, Agriculture and Society from the Rural Federal University of Rio de Janeiro. She is the author of the book “Food and Energy Sovereignty Now: Brazilian Grassroots Position on Agroenergy” published by the Oakland Institute in February 2008. (Bulatlat.com)
