Biofuels and the presidential elections in Senegal

Senegal is the only country in West-Africa not to have suffered civil war or coup d'état since it became independent from France. Today, the Senegalese elect their new leader in a well organised democratic election. The incumbent, president Abdoulaye Wade, is widely expected to win in the first round, against 14 competitors.

Mr Wade made biofuels an issue during the campaign. At the eve of the elections, during a mass rally in the capital Dakar, Wade summarized his vision one more time and told supporters that "within two years, Senegal will have transformed agriculture into an energy sector capable of producing biofuels. We must escape the tyranny of petroleum." He added that "Senegal's farmers will supply the SENELEC (state-run utility company) with biofuels" and "our farmers will become oil sheiks." Finally, in what reportedly was a popular announcement, Wade told the crowd that "our country will begin to make cars 'made in Senegal' in collaboration with Peugeot."

Election promises aside, over the past year, Senegal's government has been one of the most outspoken supporters of biofuels in Africa, with arguments ranging from the capacity of biofuels to strengthen local economies by cutting oil dependence, the potential to bring jobs and reduce the huge and tragic problem of economic emigration towards Europe (earlier post), to reviving and diversifying the agricultural sector to make it less dependent on commodities for which world market prices have declined or become highly volatile.

Wade has been very active on this front, first by creating a 'Green OPEC' of sorts - dubbed the Pays Africains Non-Producteurs de Pétrole (PANPP) - uniting 15 non-oil producing countries (earlier post). The main goal of the PANPP is to exchange knowledge, technology and market opportunities for biofuels across Africa. The organisation is also working towards getting African oil producing countries to share some of their profits with the PANNP, to invest the funds in biofuel production. Trying to reach a Western audience, Wade published an open letter in The Washington Post, explaining the sense of urgency behind the initiative (earlier post):
biomass :: bioenergy :: biofuels :: energy :: sustainability :: ethanol :: biodiesel :: energy independence :: rural development :: Senegal ::

On more than one occasion, the Senegalese president also warned against the dangers of petro-politics and warned multinational oil companies to invest far more in the countries where they operate and to distribute wealth to their populations, because if they don't, the 'Niger Delta' scenario (where people have turned against oil companies) will become the rule throughout Africa (earlier post).

The Wade government has made the first concrete steps towards the realisation of a biofuel program: besides the creation of several institutions and 'agro-energy' programs, which include extension services and financing mechanisms (earlier post), the distribution of 250 million jatropha seedlings amongst the rural population was announced late last year (earlier post).

Finally, in an exemplary South-South exchange, Senegal has been co-operating with Brazil and India on analysing the best strategies to create a viable national bioenergy program (earlier post).

More information:
Rewmi (Dakar): Abdoulaye Wade se donne deux ans pour concrétiser ses projets - Feb. 24, 2007.
Nouvel Observateur: Abdoulaye Wade se veut le président de la jeunesse sénégalaise - Feb. 24, 2007.
L'Observateur Paalga (Ouagadougou), via AllAfrica: Sénégal: 14 contre Wade - Feb. 22, 2007.