Second FAO technical consultation on bioenergy and food security - Summary proceedings

Apr 2008

An important constraint to bioenergy development will be water availability and use. At the present time the real cost of water, in particular that of maintaining and preserving the water resources upstream, is not being paid by the farmers or the agro-industry sector. The newly signed free trade agreement with the USA may lead to a reduction of agricultural exports and increment of imports and a change in relative prices which are likely to play a role on farmers’ incentives in the production of specific crops. This can have a significant effect on the future agriculture scenarios, at least in the production of feedstock related to the first generation feedstocks.
The issues of food security must be thoroughly considered and different bioenergy chain models scales must be considered as alternative options to the large, mono crop, highly mechanized, capital intensive production schemes that may tend to prevent small farmers from benefiting from this emerging market.
At this moment, an integrated biofuel policy that incorporates agriculture, food security, energy, transport, forestry and other interests does not exist. Recently, three ministries (transport, energy, agriculture) have established a committee aiming at defining a strategy and long-term policies.
The second FAO Bioenergy and Food Security (BEFS) technical consultation held its last round of discussions on 5-6 February 2008 to peer review and finalize the BEFS framework that assesses the bioenergy development and food security nexus. The project achieved good progress in the last months and it can now build on an excellent qualitative framework and take the next step to work on the country level including scenario building and data analysis.

By: Bioenergy and Food Security Project(BEFS) - FAO

 
download this document:   248 kb
home