Bio Fuel

Over the past few years, the world has been witness to the increasing problem of food shortages.One argument is that in our thirst for environmentally friendly fuels by using bio fuels, we are contributing to the increasing food prices as more and more farmers are keen to grow crops like corn to make ehanol to be used as fuel instead of food.As an off shoot of this, the prices of other crops are also increasing. In a way agricultural production is diverted away from food crops often leading to mass starvation in poor and under developed countries.

As energy crop programmes often compete with food crops in terms of investments, infrastructure, skilled labour etc,food shortages and price increases in food crops follow automatically.But even the food shortages in the world have to be looked at more objectively. Use of bio fuels alone is not the reason for world food shortages.It should be seen against the backdrop of the region or country's real situation concerning food supply and demand.More often than not, the agricultural production potential of a certain region is under utilized or food crops are used as animal feed. All these factors contribute to the food shortages.

In order to meet the increasing food and fuel needs,the need of the hour is to adopt modern agricultural practices and come up with efficient methods to utilise available land and other resources.Also potential of marginal land to grow fuel crops should be made use of.

Though arguments abound that increased use of bioenergy in the developed countries is responsible for starvation in poor and under developed countries, much thought is not being given to the huge amounts of bio-mass wasted in various ways in developed countries. Bio-mass in the form of agricultural and forestry residues,by products of commercial food processing and vast amounts of waste cooking oil dumped in land fills and sewers has to be treated properly and made use of for a cleaner environment.

In the US, the main fuel crops are corn (maize), for ethanol, and soybeans producing soy oil for biodiesel. These are the crops which allegedly should not be diverted from food crops to fuel crops to reduce malnutrition and starvation.

The contention that people the world over are starving because of ethanol production from food crops is not true.Starvation is because people are vitims of an in equitable economic system.Among the 4.4 billion people who live in developing countries:

Three fifths have no access to basic sanitation Almost One third are without safe drinking water One quarter lack adequate housing One fifthlive beyond reach of modern health services One fifth are undernourished The 3 richest people in the world own assets that exceed the combined gross national product of all least developed countries and their 600 million people.

There are many different fuel crops which can be grown using sustainable methods which conserve or even improve the environment giving higher yields. With most biofuels you remove the energy and are still left with the food which can be used as feed for livestock. With ethanol the feed value is enhanced: the distillers dried grains by-product is more nutritious than the original unprocessed grain because of the yeast. With biodiesel, the oil seed cake is left after the oil has been pressed out which is usually a highly nutritious, high-protein livestock feed.

As for poor countries, local production of biofuels from locally grown crops,can cut dependence and cash expenditure on imported fuels, increase community self-reliance, and provide opportunities for local job creation and growth. It can also cut dependence on fuel wood, which is often scarce and causes immense health problems through indoor air-pollution.All this shows that growing biofuels crops can encourage food-crop production rather than reducing it or causing food shortages.

Sowmya