The NFU has long argued that European and UK production can produce both food and fuel, whilst helping us to achieve our renewable transport fuel targets. A recent European Commission report in fact concluded the same and stated that they do not anticipate that the EU 10% renewable energy target for transport in 2020 to significantly impact global food prices and food affordability in developing countries. Their analysis found that since 2008 that any common trend between biofuel production and commodity prices ceases to exist, and the two actually move in opposite directions.
Globally cereal and oilseed stocks are high and despite earlier concerns for 2015/16 many production forecasts have been revised upwards, confidence in these revisions is plain for all to see in the falling prices on international markets. If we were ever to enter a period of shortage crops earmarked for biofuel production could be easily and quickly reallocated into the food chain, hence they effectively act as a buffer. What the biofuel market does is give security to farmers that markets exist for their products and this confidence allows them to manage volatility and make better informed business decisions for on farm investment and budgeting. As a result the NFU has been active in this area and has been lobbying at the highest levels in the UK and in Brussels to ensure the biofuel markets remain open and incentivised against movements by oil cartels to destabilise supplies of energy that might compete with their hydrocarbons. Biofuel production also produces a valuable co-product in the form of high protein animal feed, where the UK has a deficit of around 70% for, and increases in production would allow us to begin closing down this gap.
‘Food vs fuel’ isn’t the only controversial claim levelled at biofuels, there is a widely documented debate about the flawed assumption of ‘indirect land use change’ (ILUC) that is claimed occours as a result of involving agricultural feedstocks in fuel production. This has eventually led to a ruling in the European Parliament which limits the volume of crops used in biofuel production to 7%. The NFU lobbied hard against this political amendment and these recent FAO figures only back up our argument - that it is possible to sustainably produce both food and fuel across the world. As ‘ILUC’ has been impossible to prove, the NFU is still active in this area and through our membership of the European Oilseeds Alliance we continue to work with the European Commission on their assumptions and support evidence-based policymaking on questions behind ILUC.