biofuelwatch: LETTER TO YOUR MEP: Biofuels : Renewable Energy Directive

LETTER TO YOUR MEPs

Please ask MEPs to vote against biofuel targets and for an agrofuel moratorium

Background

On 7th July, the EU Parliament Environment Committee will vote on the Renewable Energy Directive. Already, the current 5.75% biofuel target and the EU's declared intention to further increase this to 10% by 2020 is encouraging large-scale land conversion to agrofuel monocultures across the world, as well as investment in refineries and infrastructure, including roads, waterways and ports which will open up the world's last large continuous tropical forests to destruction.

The 'sustainability criteria' put forward by the European Commission are completely inadequate. They include no social criteria - i.e. they allow even agrofuels linked to human rights abuses to be classed as 'sustainable', they leave many large biodiverse areas, such as the Brazilian Cerrado, unprotected, and they include greenhouse gas default values which are contrary to peer-reviewed studies. However, even if the criteria were strengthened, they would still not address indirect impacts, i.e. the fact higher commodity prices are already leading to large-scale monoculture expansion at the expense of rainforests, small farmers and other communities, food production, food prices, wetlands and other biodiverse ecosystems all over the world.

Only a moratorium on agrofuels from large-scale monocultures and, in particular, on all targets and incentives, can prevent further harm (see: www.econexus.info/biofuels.html).

Apart from signing the letter below, which will be sent to all your MEPs, it would be very helpful if you could also contact your MEPs directly - if possible meet them during a surgery. Personal contacts with MEPs are by far the most effective. Find UK MEP details

Suggested letter below. You can edit the letter text and subject line below as you see fit. Personalising your message will increase its impact A Word version of this letter is available here if you would prefer to post your MEPs the letter.

SELECT YOUR MEP's FROM YOUR MP/CONSTITUENCY AREA:

(YOUR MP WILL NOT BE EMAILED, BUT THIS ENABLES US TO CORRECTLY IDENTIFY YOUR MEPs).

Dear Sir/Madam

subject

On 7th July, the members of the Environment Committee will be asked to vote on the Renewable Energy Directive, and on later (probably September) there will be a vote in the Industry Committee. I urge you, as my MEP, to vote against any biofuel targets and incentives if you are a member of either committee. If you are not on one of those committees, please use your influence to raise the serious concerns about the impacts which EU biofuel policy is having on communities, access to food, climate change, biodiversity and human rights. And please support a call for an immediate EU moratorium on agrofuels from large-scale monocultures and in particular on agrofuel targets and incentives Europe's current biofuel targets and incentives - and the plans to further increase them up to 2020, are already leading to large-scale investment in new monoculture plantations, new infrastructure investment, including in the world's last large continuous tropical forests, and new refineries which causing major and irreversible destruction now. Those investments are happening today, and they cannot be reversed by any future 'sustainability criteria'. Some of those destructive agrofuel investments include: + The accelerated destruction of the Brazilian Cerrado for sugar cane and soybean: According to the Brazilian NGO Instituto Sociedade, População e Natureza, 152,000 hectares of land designated by the government as 'conservation areas' are being converted to sugarcane plantations. According to an IUF report, half of the Cerrado has already been converted to monocultures and all of the rest is likely to be destroyed before 2030. This will have cause the extinction of very large numbers of species, destroy the livelihoods of large numbers of people, including indigenous communities, and accelerate climate change by releasing large amounts of carbon held in the soil and vegetation and destroying an essential watershed for the Amazon forest. + High soya prices, guaranteed by government support for agrofuels, are encouraging investment in new waterways and ports in South America: In Paraguay, for example, Cargill have been granted permission for a mega-port in Asuncion, which is likely to pollute the drinking water supply on which more than a million people depend. It will also lead to major biodiversity losses and to further soya expansion inland. + In Tanzania, large areas of community land are being handed over to foreign companies to plant agrofuel crops. In Kisarawe District, a government agency has handed over 9,000 hectares of land on which over 11,000 people depend for their livelihoods to the UK firm Sun Biofuels plc, for a jatropha plantation. Compensation payments are almost certainly too small to allow families to access other land. None of the 'sustainability criteria' being discussed can prevent any of those investments. They do not currently include social criteria but, even if they did, they could not address indirect impacts and the wider investments encouraged by high commodity prices. The greenhouse gas default values which have been proposed do not in any way reflect the real climate change impacts: Two recent peer-reviewed studies, by T Searchinger et al and J Fargione et al show that, at present, virtually all agrofuels result in higher greenhouse gas emissions than the fossil fuels they replace, provided indirect impacts are considered. Yet the default values being discussed suggest that virtually all agrofuels save emissions - something not backed up by any peer-reviewed study. Only a moratorium on agrofuels from large-scale monocultures can prevent further harm being caused by EU biofuel policy. Over 200 organisations from North and South support a call for such an EU moratorium. All targets and incentives must be dropped because right now, sustainability cannot be guaranteed. Yours faithfully,
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