Brazil: Don't blame biofuels for food crisis, says president

Brazil’s president has made an impassioned defence of biofuels, denying that their production contributes to food scarcity and rising world prices.

Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva also sharply criticised industrial countries for subsidising agricultural output, which he blamed for undermining the competitiveness of developing nations and reducing world production.

“Biofuels aren’t the villain that threatens food security,” he said at the start of a Latin American meeting in Brasilia of the United Nations’ Food and Agricultural Organisation.

“On the contrary ... they can pull countries out of energy dependency without affecting foods.”

Brazil is the world’s leading exporter of ethanol, and the world’s number two producer after the US. Brazil makes the biofuel from sugar cane, as opposed to the corn-based ethanol that dominates US production.

Mr Silva’s speech was seen as a response to a UN report released on Tuesday that called biofuels a “crime against humanity” for diverting food crops toward fuel production as a global scarcity deepens and food prices rise.

The report said farmers worldwide must reduce dependency on fossil fuels and better protect the environment, as riots erupt over food shortages in the Caribbean and Africa and hunger approaches crisis stage in parts of Asia. It recommended an international moratorium on incentives for producing and marketing biofuels.

Mr Silva said that argument was the work of “second-guessers” giving opinions about Brazil from overseas.

“The real crimes against humanity are discarding biofuels and criticising countries, energy dependence and food insecurity,” he said.

“If there is no reduction of agricultural subsidies in Europe, it will be difficult for poor countries to be competitive.”

Delegates from several Latin American countries had criticised biofuels in meetings before the conference, which ends tomorrow.