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    Spanish company Ferry Group is to invest €42/US$55.2 million in a project for the production of biomass fuel pellets in Bulgaria. The 3-year project consists of establishing plantations of paulownia trees near the city of Tran. Paulownia is a fast-growing tree used for the commercial production of fuel pellets. Dnevnik - Feb. 20, 2007.

    Hungary's BHD Hõerõmû Zrt. is to build a 35 billion Forint (€138/US$182 million) commercial biomass-fired power plant with a maximum output of 49.9 MW in Szerencs (northeast Hungary). Portfolio.hu - Feb. 20, 2007.

    Tonight at 9pm, BBC Two will be showing a program on geo-engineering techniques to 'save' the planet from global warming. Five of the world's top scientists propose five radical scientific inventions which could stop climate change dead in its tracks. The ideas include: a giant sunshade in space to filter out the sun's rays and help cool us down; forests of artificial trees that would breath in carbon dioxide and stop the green house effect and a fleet futuristic yachts that will shoot salt water into the clouds thickening them and cooling the planet. BBC News - Feb. 19, 2007.

    Archer Daniels Midland, the largest U.S. ethanol producer, is planning to open a biodiesel plant in Indonesia with Wilmar International Ltd. this year and a wholly owned biodiesel plant in Brazil before July, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday. The Brazil plant is expected to be the nation's largest, the paper said. Worldwide, the company projects a fourfold rise in biodiesel production over the next five years. ADM was not immediately available to comment. Reuters - Feb. 16, 2007.

    Finnish engineering firm Pöyry Oyj has been awarded contracts by San Carlos Bioenergy Inc. to provide services for the first bioethanol plant in the Philippines. The aggregate contract value is EUR 10 million. The plant is to be build in the Province of San Carlos on the north-eastern tip of Negros Island. The plant is expected to deliver 120,000 liters/day of bioethanol and 4 MW of excess power to the grid. Kauppalehti Online - Feb. 15, 2007.

    In order to reduce fuel costs, a Mukono-based flower farm which exports to Europe, is building its own biodiesel plant, based on using Jatropha curcas seeds. It estimates the fuel will cut production costs by up to 20%. New Vision (Kampala, Uganda) - Feb. 12, 2007.

    The Tokyo Metropolitan Government has decided to use 10% biodiesel in its fleet of public buses. The world's largest city is served by the Toei Bus System, which is used by some 570,000 people daily. Digital World Tokyo - Feb. 12, 2007.

    Fearing lack of electricity supply in South Africa and a price tag on CO2, WSP Group SA is investing in a biomass power plant that will replace coal in the Letaba Citrus juicing plant which is located in Tzaneen. Mining Weekly - Feb. 8, 2007.

    In what it calls an important addition to its global R&D capabilities, Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) is to build a new bioenergy research center in Hamburg, Germany. World Grain - Feb. 5, 2007.

    EthaBlog's Henrique Oliveira interviews leading Brazilian biofuels consultant Marcelo Coelho who offers insights into the (foreign) investment dynamics in the sector, the history of Brazilian ethanol and the relationship between oil price trends and biofuels. EthaBlog - Feb. 2, 2007.

    The government of Taiwan has announced its renewable energy target: 12% of all energy should come from renewables by 2020. The plan is expected to revitalise Taiwan's agricultural sector and to boost its nascent biomass industry. China Post - Feb. 2, 2007.

    Production at Cantarell, the world's second biggest oil field, declined by 500,000 barrels or 25% last year. This virtual collapse is unfolding much faster than projections from Mexico's state-run oil giant Petroleos Mexicanos. Wall Street Journal - Jan. 30, 2007.

    Dubai-based and AIM listed Teejori Ltd. has entered into an agreement to invest €6 million to acquire a 16.7% interest in Bekon, which developed two proprietary technologies enabling dry-fermentation of biomass. Both technologies allow it to design, establish and operate biogas plants in a highly efficient way. Dry-Fermentation offers significant advantages to the existing widely used wet fermentation process of converting biomass to biogas. Ame Info - Jan. 22, 2007.

    Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited is to build a biofuel production plant in the tribal belt of Banswara, Rajasthan, India. The petroleum company has acquired 20,000 hectares of low value land in the district, which it plans to commit to growing jatropha and other biofuel crops. The company's chairman said HPCL was also looking for similar wasteland in the state of Chhattisgarh. Zee News - Jan. 15, 2007.

    The Zimbabwean national police begins planting jatropha for a pilot project that must result in a daily production of 1000 liters of biodiesel. The Herald (Harare), Via AllAfrica - Jan. 12, 2007.

    In order to meet its Kyoto obligations and to cut dependence on oil, Japan has started importing biofuels from Brazil and elsewhere. And even though the country has limited local bioenergy potential, its Agriculture Ministry will begin a search for natural resources, including farm products and their residues, that can be used to make biofuels in Japan. To this end, studies will be conducted at 900 locations nationwide over a three-year period. The Japan Times - Jan. 12, 2007.

    Chrysler's chief economist Van Jolissaint has launched an arrogant attack on "quasi-hysterical Europeans" and their attitudes to global warming, calling the Stern Review 'dubious'. The remarks illustrate the yawning gap between opinions on climate change among Europeans and Americans, but they also strengthen the view that announcements by US car makers and legislators about the development of green vehicles are nothing more than window dressing. Today, the EU announced its comprehensive energy policy for the 21st century, with climate change at the center of it. BBC News - Jan. 10, 2007.

    The new Canadian government is investing $840,000 into BioMatera Inc. a biotech company that develops industrial biopolymers (such as PHA) that have wide-scale applications in the plastics, farmaceutical and cosmetics industries. Plant-based biopolymers such as PHA are biodegradable and renewable. Government of Canada - Jan. 9, 2007.


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Tuesday, August 15, 2006

Stiglitz explains reasons behind the demise of the Doha development round

Earlier we pointed to the collapse of the WTO "Doha Round" and what it could mean for the development of a global biofuels industry. We wrote that US and EU subsidies and tariffs are to blame for the failure and we gave the example of US tariffs on ethanol.
Today, in a column published in the Taipei Times, Joseph Stiglitz - the 2001 recipient of the Nobel Prize in economics - takes a look at the reasons behind the demise of the Doha development round. And not surprisingly, he too gives the same example of biofuels to illustrate his case:


Reasons behind the demise of the Doha development round - By Joseph Stiglitz

Hopes for a development round in world trade -- opening up opportunities for developing countries to grow and reduce poverty -- now seem dashed. Though crocodile tears may be shed all around, the extent of disappointment needs to be calibrated: Pascal Lamy, the head of the WTO, had long worked to diminish expectations, so much so that it was clear that whatever emerged would bring, at most, limited benefits to poor countries.

The failure hardly comes as a surprise: the US and the EU had long ago reneged on the promises they made in 2001 at Doha to rectify the imbalances of the last round of trade negotiations -- a round so unfair that the world's poorest countries were actually made worse off. Once again, the US' lack of commitment to multi-lateralism, its obstinacy and its willingness to put political expediency above principles -- and even its own national interests -- has triumphed. With elections looming in November, US President George W. Bush could not "sacrifice" the 25,000 wealthy cotton farmers or the 10,000 prosperous rice farmers and their campaign contributions. Seldom have so many had to give up so much to protect the interests of so few.

The talks bogged down over agriculture, where subsidies and trade restrictions remain so much higher than in manufacturing. With 70 percent or so of people in developing countries depending directly or indirectly on agriculture, they are the losers under the current regime. But the focus on agriculture diverted attention from a far broader agenda that could have been pursued in ways that would have benefited both the northern and the southern hemispheres.

For example, so-called "escalating tariffs," which tax processed goods at a far higher rate than unprocessed products, mean that manufacturing tariffs discourage developing countries from undertaking the higher value-added activities that create jobs and boost incomes.

Perhaps the most outrageous example is the US$0.14 per liter import tariff on ethanol in the US, whereas there is no tariff on oil, and only a US$0.13 per liter tax on gasoline. This contrasts with the US$0.13 per liter subsidy that US companies (a huge portion of which goes to a single firm) receive on ethanol. Thus, foreign producers can't compete unless their costs are US$0.27 per liter lower than those of US producers.

The huge subsidies have meant that the US has become the largest producer of ethanol in the world. Yet, despite this huge advantage, some foreign firms can still make it in the US market.

Brazilian sugar-based ethanol costs far less to produce than US corn-based ethanol. Brazil's firms are far more efficient than the US' subsidized industry, which puts more energy into getting subsidies out of Congress than into improving efficiency. Some studies suggest that it requires more energy to produce ethanol in the US than is contained in the fuel. If the US eliminated these unfair trade barriers, it would buy more energy from Brazil and less from the Middle East. Evidently, the Bush administration would rather help Middle Eastern oil producers, whose interests so often seem at variance with those of the US, than Brazil. Of course, the administration never puts it that way -- with an energy policy forged by the oil companies, Archer Daniels Midland and other ethanol producers are just playing along in a corrupt system of campaign contributions for subsidies:
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In the trade talks, the US said that it would cut subsidies only if others reciprocated by opening their markets. But, as one developing country minister put it, "Our farmers can compete with America's farmers; we just can't compete with America's Treasury." Developing countries cannot, and should not, open up their markets fully to the US' agricultural goods unless US subsidies are fully eliminated. To compete on a level playing field would force these countries to subsidize their farmers, diverting scarce funds that are needed for education, health, and infrastructure.

In other areas of trade, the principle of countervailing duties has been recognized: when a country imposes a subsidy, others can impose a tax to offset the unfair advantage given to that country's producers. If markets are opened up, countries should be given the right to countervail US and European subsidies. This would be a major step forward in trying to create a fair trade regime that promotes development.

At the onset of the development round, most developing countries worried not only that the EU and the US would renege on their promises (which they have in large part), but also that the resulting agreement would once again make them worse off. As a result, much of the developing world is relieved that at least this risk has been avoided.

Still, there was a second risk: that the world would think that the agreement itself had accomplished the objectives of a development round set forth at Doha, with trade negotiators then turning once again to making the next round as unfair as previous rounds. This concern, too, now seems to have been allayed.

There remains one further concern: the US has rushed to sign a series of bilateral trade agreements that are even more one-sided and unfair to developing countries, which may prompt Europe and others to do likewise. This divide-and-conquer strategy undermines the multilateral trade system, which is based on the principle of non-discrimination. Countries that sign these agreements get preferential treatment over all others. But developing countries have little to gain and much to lose by signing these agreements, which almost never deliver the promised benefits.

Indeed, the entire world is the loser if the multilateral trade system is weakened. The rest of the world must not embrace the US' unilateral approach: the multilateral trade system is too precious to allow it to be destroyed by a US president who has repeatedly shown his contempt for global democracy and multi-lateralism.

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