EU Trade minister says no funding farmers for biofuels
Farm subsidies have long been a thorny issue in Europe, both between the EU and the rest of the world and between member states. Many of the member countries have used subsidies to support their local farmers much to their neighbors chagrin. European Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson is now making statements that would be considered sacrilegious to subsidy supporters by saying that the EU should be open to biofuel imports.
EU policies should emphasize getting the the cleanest, cheapest fuels rather than pushing for domestic options that may not be as efficient. Currently Brazilian sugarcane ethanol is slapped with a seventy percent import tariff that EU produced corn ethanol is not subject too. Mandelson feels that EU policies should be focused on the environmental benefits by making sure that fuels are produced in a sustainable manner that doesn't include deforestation and excessive water use.
[Source: Automotive News - Sub. req'd]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Ron Steenblik (Global Subsidies Initiative) 1:29AM (7/07/2007)
Great that Peter Mandelson is now saying that the EU should be open to biofuel imports, but what is he concretely going to do about it? In the mean time, the high import tariff on fuel ethanol remains. (Biodiesel is already subject to a relatively low tariff of 6.5%.)
If the EU is planning to differentiate supplies (imports as well as domestic production) contingent on demonstration the criteria relating to how the biofuel has been produced and processed -- in trade jargon, on non-product-related processes and production methods (PPMs) -- all I can say is: good luck. PPM measures are problematic for the World Trade Oganization, which accepts them as a basis of trade discrimination only under very limited conditions, such as the existence and wide application of an agreed international standard. Such an agreed and widely applied international standard does not yet exist.
By the way, the EU does not produce most of its ethanol from corn (maize). It produces its ethanol from a wide range of sources, including maize but also wheat, sugar beet and wine.
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Dave 8:33AM (7/09/2007)
Biofuel is a waste of farmland and O2 producing forests.
Solar collectors produce more power per acre without consuming potable water sources and can be installed in otherwise uninhabitable areas.
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