Europe’s thirst for biofuels spells hunger for millions, as food prices shoot up

“Europe has helped spark a global rush for biofuels that is forcing poor families from their homes, while big business piles up the profits.”
---> Natalia Alonso, Head of Oxfam’s EU Office


17 September 2012

Land used to power European cars with biofuels for one year could produce enough wheat and maize to feed 127 million people, Oxfam reveals ahead of today’s important EU Energy Ministers’ meeting.

With the world’s poorest at greater risk of hunger as a result of spiraling food prices, the international agency is calling on the EU to rethink its dangerous love affair with biofuels.

In a new GROW campaign report, The Hunger Grains, Oxfam warns that Europe’s growing appetite for biofuels is pushing up global food prices and driving people off their land, resulting in deeper hunger and malnutrition in poor countries.

In Europe, EU biofuel mandates could cost every adult about €30 each year by 2020. In 2008, about €3 billion were spent in tax exemptions and other incentives for biofuel production in the EU, comparable to the value of cuts agreed under the controversial Greek bail-out deal in February.

“Depriving millions of people of food, land and water”...

Source: Europe’s thirst for biofuels spells hunger for millions, as food prices shoot up
Author: OXFAM

Link: Leaked EU proposal deals biofuel crops blow
Link: European biofuel targets contributing to global hunger, says Oxfam
Link: Up to half of global food production goes to waste