Meals per gallon - The impact of industrial biofuels on people and global hunger |
Jan 2010
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According to the authors of this report, industrial biofuels would not offer a solution to the two main aims of EU biofuel policy – to combat climate change and increase fuel security. Rather, industrial biofuels would fuel poverty and hunger because they are now competing with food crops, dramatically increasing the prices that poor people pay for food worldwide. At the same time, biofuels would have disastrous local impacts on food security and land rights for many of the communities where they are grown.
Industrial biofuels are referred as the main cause of the food crisis and recent rises in hunger. Despite this, political action on hunger and biofuels has been minimal.
The hunger and climate crises require immediate and sustainable responses – and industrial biofuels are not the answer. The easiest and best way to reduce the impact of the transport sector on hunger and GHG emissions, as well as improve our energy security, is to reduce the overall consumption of energy by transport. In terms of climate change, this will yield immediate and guaranteed reductions in GHGs.
However ActionAid is in favour of sustainable biofuels. But industrial biofuels – large-scale, intensive monocultures – are clearly unsustainable in ActionAid’s view.
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