The European Commission made a commitment to increase to 10 % part of biofuels transport  before 2020. In spite of the presentation of this measure under an environmentalist perspective, we fear that the consequences are particularly harmful to the environment and the southern peoples.

The advantage of biofuels (which primarily involve the processing of food crops and raw materials into fuel) is that they produce at the level of the consumption fewer greenhouse gases emissions than conventional fuels derived from petroleum. But it is also and perhaps especially important that these fuels do not come from oil, which allows lower costs firstly and secondly it substantially reduces the dependence of certain states.

The current problem is that to produce this biofuel, we need lands, many lands.

The European Commission has, despite all of this, been engaged since March 2007 and has fixed the target of 10 % of biofuel in fuels for transport in every member state before 2020.

In total, therefore, 17.5 million hectares should be cultivated in 2020 to produce biofuels of the first and second generation. Lands which will partly be outside Europe and especially in Africa. Already, in Kenya, 50 000 hectares have been negotiated by the Kenya Jatropha energy, fillialle of the Italian Nuove Iniziative Industriali for two euros per year and per hectare.

This puts two main interrelated problems, one green, another alimentary;
Indeed, a lot of environmental NGO's, and a significant part of the scientific community denounce the risks of a massive deforestation linked to the search of new fertile lands. Cutting and burning the wood provokes the drying out of wetlands of rain forests, with the disappearance of the local biodiversity, these operations emit large quantities of carbon into the atmosphere.

Subsequently, this same search for fertile land and the fact that they are for most edible crops to be transformed into biofuels can alarm us about the consequences of this new market on food sovereignty of the southern countries. Biofuel production is realistically going to considerably reduce  the agricultural production capacities and is risks to increase significantly the price of goods such as cereals.

(In June 2008, a report from the World Bank estimated that biofuels were already responsible for a 75% increase in food prices.)