Biofuel comes with a price tag
April 30th, 2008 | Published in Africa, Business and Entrepreneurship, Energy, Nigeria | 4 Comments
I’m all for a greener earth and healthier environment. However, the current global drive to produce crop-derived ethanol or biofuel as a substitute for fossil fuel may just be a double-edged sword for Nigeria and Africa in general.
Ethanol (ethanol fuel) is being used as an additive to gasoline (petrol) in most modern economies, and its use is being canvassed in Nigeria as well - Ondo state government is about to partner NNPC on cassava ethanol project.
While ethanol can be derived from diverse sources, its primarily produced from corn in the U.S, and cassava in Nigeria. The demand for corn by ethanol plants has pumped up the price of corn in America - and this effect will be seen in Nigeria when ethanol plants start using cassava.
Cassava is the source of several stable food items in Africa. When farmers would rather plant cassava and sell their produce to the ethanol plants for more money- then what happens to the food prices, including garri and other items derived from it?
There is no doubt that Nigeria needs to leap-frog into this modern time of biofuel-production and usage, but for its benefits (biofuel is a greener and sustainable energy source) to be most apparent and meaningful - generation of cassava/corn-derived biofuel must be done with care and control to ensure its impacts on food supply and price are minimal.
May 2nd, 2008 at 1:26 pm (#)
Please educate me. Is the Biofuel really for a greener earth and healthy environment or simply a substitue? For talking about healthy environment, how can the environment in Lagos, Ondo, Kano etc and the whole of Nigeria be ever healthy with all the health hazzards that we permit to kill Nigerians softly e.g. open waste sites, acrid burning fumes from refuse dumps and of course the worst pollutants, emissions from vehicles that should definitely be off road. Until these are tackled successfully e.g. following the Calabar model, a greener earth and healthy environment is a tall order.
May 3rd, 2008 at 1:07 pm (#)
If the rest of the world is going biofuel then it might be difficult for any nation to stay behind. Remember fossil fuel is none-renewable and will someday be exhausted and until we find a way to efficiently exploit solar energy or convert water into fuel then biofuel remains the only viable next energy source to power the earth.
Haven said that, I expect one on the following to happen to Nigeria and Africa when the world finally settles for biofuel.
Firstly, the governments will immediately see the potential in the new development and plan to take full opportunity of it. They will also see the threat and incorporate measures in their plans to avert the dangers. They will take their nations back to the farms (from the oil rigs and diamond mines).
Agriculture will regain its old glory. Our wasting arable lands will once again become the main stay of our economies. Farming will once again become a prestigious profession, a description we have long given up for working in oil firms. Why not? For the first time in a along time our economies will now depend on what hardworking citizens are doing on their farms. National economies will become grass-root based again. National earnings will flow around along the path of productivity.
Governments will begin to truly see the dangers in poor infrastructures. If the roads are bad, produce can not move out of the farms, sending shockwaves down the spine of leaders. Why? Simple. No farm produce to export, no money in the government’s purse. Currently a handful of expatriate oil companies and miners provide all they need so why would they even bother about us!
Above all, the governments will ensure that we produce enough so that our agro-based exports will in no way adversely affect our ability to feed ourselves.
The second thing I fear might happen is that our governments will wait in the background and do nothing. Efforts will not be made to improve on our agricultural productivity. Prices of agro-products will rise in the international market prompting the emergence of smuggling cartels that will specialize in smuggling out our food. Prices of food will skyrocket. Hunger and starvation will set in prompting crisis in all spheres of our national lives.
I don’t think we can stop the world from going biofuel but I believe we can choose the kind of impact we want this impending revolution to have on our nations and continent.
May 4th, 2008 at 7:57 am (#)
@ Kunle, I believe you are right espcially on the price of food which is already skyrocketing so much in Nigeria presently and is a big cause for concern. You see, I thank you for the educational analysis above for with your input I have learnt much more and at the same assured myself that the issue is not that of Boifuel being for a greener healthier environ but for agricultural and socio-economic improvements. Thanks.
May 4th, 2008 at 10:08 pm (#)
Biofuel is sustainable (replaceable) unlike fossil fuel (e.g petrol and coal). The process of drilling or mining for fossil fuel is harmful to the environment - for example those gas flares and oil spillage in Nigeria. Also, fossil fuel emit carbon dioxide - source of greenhouse gases, and other pollutants in the air.
Biofuel has none or little of those properties.
@ Kunle - I would love to see the day our govt. does as you’ve stated.