The Black Informant | African American Commentary, News and Community Building

Someone is running a game on them.

Ethiopia to develop biofuels to cut oil imports

(africagoodnews.com) “Ethiopia wants to emulate Brazil by developing biofuels to cut its dependence on oil imports that cost the Horn of Africa nation more than a billion dollars a year, a government official said.

Ephrem Hassen, coordinator of biofuels development in the Ministry of Mines and Energy, told Reuters in an interview that Ethiopia was developing biofuel crops on more than half a million hectares of arid land.

“Castor oil plants, jatropha and palm oil plants are being developed over 500 000 hectares of arid and barren lands in different parts of the country so as to reduce land-locked Ethiopia’s dependency on imported oil,” Ephrem said.

The two major biofuels are petroleum substitute ethanol, which is mainly produced from grains and sugar crops, and biodiesel for which the major feedstocks are vegetable oils.

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Non-food crops such as jatropha can be grown on semi-arid land and poss less of a threat to food production than other biofuel feedstocks such as grains and vegetable oils.” (more…)

“Less of a threat???”

Why should the food production of Ethiopia be threatened at all to produce fuel? While they threw jatropha in there to shield this program from criticism, biofuel is still largely dependent on crops and land that could be used for food production.

Struggling Ethiopian farmers regret opting for biofuel crops over food crops

by Aaron Maasho Sodo

With a slight reeling in his gait, Ashenafi Chote ventures into his small plot of land and shakes his head, his eyes full of regret: “I made a mistake.”

For the last 10 years, his plot in southern Ethiopia had kept his family of four alive by supplying enough food to eat and even surplus to sell, in a region often ravaged by drought and food shortages. But since swapping from a subsistence to a biofuel crop several months ago, his once treasured source of income has dried up and, worse still, he and his family are now dependent on relief from aid agencies.

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“It is considered a very important area to develop. The balance of payment (spent on petrol) is very high and we want to decrease this burden by encouraging private investment,” said Melis Teka, deputy head of energy regulation and biofuel development at the ministry of mines. “There is no possibility that arable farmland will be allocated for its purpose,” he insisted.

But in Wolaytta, where nearly half of the two-million population do not have enough to eat, several thousand farmers like Ashenafi are complaining that they have been duped into growing biofuel crops on fertile land at the expense of maize, cassava and sweet potato, the region’s staples.

Farmers say Global Energy Ethiopia, an American-Israeli subsidiary which initially acquired 2,700 hectares to grow castor beans — a toxic plant whose seed provides castor oil, lured them with false claims of continuous harvests and financial incentives.

“Experts who told us we could have up to three harvests a year and they would pay 500 birr (50 dollars) in labour costs,” 45-year-old Borja Abusha, a father of eight, said. “But it has now been six months without a harvest and they haven’t respected their promise to cover costs. We are left with nothing.” (more…)

Another question comes to mind: Is China cutting down on fuel consumption? Why is a poor African country being talked into jeopardizing their food supply while China continues to buy up more and more of African oil?