Wezi Tjaronda
17 April 2008
Windhoek — The Southern African Confederation of Agricultural Unions (SACAU) has said going into biofuel production will enable subsistence farmers to progress into commercial farming.
The regional organisation said this would also give farmers an opportunity to diversify their production, access new markets, increase their productivity and income and share in the biofuel value chain.
SACAU said in its resolutions after its annual general meeting in Windhoek last week that the organisation acknowledges that biofuels gave farmers an opportunity to diversify.
To benefit from opportunities associated with biofuels, the organisation said producers should enjoy a fair share of the benefits of the market through appropriate support mechanisms and incentives for participation in the value chain.
It said there should be equal opportunities between small and large-scale producers, while governments should put in place friendly biofuel policies and legislation which should include favourable tariff policies, transparent licensing legislation, regional standards on blending practices and security of land tenure and investment.
SACAU urged farmers' organisations to take a leading role in biofuel debates and collectively represent smallholder producers in contract farming arrangements of biofuel, while analysing the environment for biofuel production and appropriate policies and programmes that address the weaknesses.
Reports say more and more land is being diverted for biofuel production in many countries, putting pressure on food production. The Bank of Namibia 2007 Annual Report said biofuel production has increased in the past five years and is estimated to will double in the next four years.
Estimates, according to the report, are that more than 60 percent of arable land in the European Union will be needed to meet the demand of the biofuel industry for the region to replace 20 percent of the fossil fuels used in transport with biofuel.
Investors worldwide are looking for cheap sustainable forms of energy to respond to persistent high oil prices and analysts say Africa is well suited to biofuel production because of a number of factors that include the availability of land.
This however comes at a cost as biofuel production has been cited as being responsible for soaring food prices worldwide.
The bank's report said governments around the world were looking for alternatives for the current expensive oil based energy, which could be produced from maize and sugar crops.
"This has created a turnaround in the agricultural sector as the biofuel industry now competes with the food industry for raw materials," said the report launched recently.
The meeting also made resolutions around Economic Partnership Agreements focusing on rules of origin, food and safety and SPOS issues, supply side constraints, preference erosion, exclusion lists, special products and benchmarking and reviews.
The organization deliberated on statutory levies and the African Union/NEPAD's Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP).
The meeting elected a new SACAU Board, which includes Ajay Vashee (Zambia) as president, Dough Taylor-Freeme (Zimbabwe) as first vice-present and Fanny Makina (Malawi) as second vice-president.
Namibia's Raimar van Hase and Louri Bosman from South Africa were elected as board members.
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Think about it,what do you think is driving up food prices Less arable land for food production. Fewer farmers to grow food etc. etc. = much unhappiness to say the very least.