Rome, Italy
February 8, 2008
A decision-support tool developed
by FAO will help ensure that
countries can enter the rapidly growing field of bioenergy
industry to produce benefits for the poor without jeopardizing
their food security.
The tool, an “analytical framework” designed by a team of
economists from FAO, Utrecht University’s Copernicus Institute
and Darmstadt’s Oeko-Institut, was unveiled at a two-day
experts’ meeting of FAO’s Bioenergy and Food Security (BEFS)
project. The three-year project, funded by Germany, is aimed at
making sure that bioenergy does not impair global food security.
The analytical framework allows governments interested in
entering the bioenergy sector to calculate the effect of their
policy decisions on the food security of their populations.
Bioenergy can affect food prices and rural incomes and thus has
important implications – both positive and negative -- for food
security.
Positive outcomes
Applying the analytical framework will enable national policy
makers to minimize negative consequences while maximizing
positive outcomes.
A prerequisite for running the framework is the establishment of
a bioenergy development scenario, a process in which FAO helps
government clearly define their bioenergy policy options and the
various possible strategies to achieve those options.
The analytical framework then makes it possible, through five
steps, to assess: technical biomass potential; biomass
production costs; the economic bioenergy potential;
macro-economic consequences; national and household-level impact
and consequences on food security.
Vulnerable households
Analysis of the results will make it possible to determine
actual bioenergy potential and which households are most
vulnerable and thus at risk of food insecurity.
Existing mathematical modelling tools such as Quickscan, which
calculates global bioenergy potential to 2050, and FAO’s COSIMO,
which models the agricultural sector in a large number of
developing countries, will be used.
The framework will be field-tested in three countries – Peru,
Thailand and Tanzania – before the analytical framework
methodology is made available to the international community at
large.
Kyoto II
Alexander Müller, FAO Assistant Director-General for natural
resources and the environment,
said that FAO would make every effort to ensure that food
security issues are on the table when a successor to the present
Kyoto Protocol is negotiated. Although climate change could
reduce yields from the main crops in sub-Saharan Africa by up to
40 percent in the next 25 years, food security is not part of
the negotiations road map adopted at last December’s UN
Conference in Bali, Mr Müller noted.
“The challenge will be huge for sub-Saharan Africa,” Mr Muller
said. According to experts, however, the development of the
bioenergy sector in Africa could help mitigate the effects of
climate change there.
FAO is organizing a High Level Conference on World Food Security
and the Challenges of Climate Change and Bioenergy in Rome from
3 to 5 June. |
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