Tag Archives: green
New Biofuel Proposals Could Have ‘Severe Implications’
22 April 2013 A PROPOSAL to reduce the market size for biofuel production in Europe will damage farmer confidence and reduce the incentive to produce for food, feed and fuel, the NFU has warned. The warning comes following the publication of a draft opinion on the indirect land use change (ILUC) proposal by French MEP Corinne Lepage. As the European Parliament’s lead rapporteur on the Environment Committee, Ms Lepage will set the tone for forthcoming debates on the contribution biofuels can make to the Renewable Energy Directive targets, which currently require member states to achieve 10 per cent renewable transport fuel by 2020. The draft opinion seeks to introduce ILUC factors on biofuel production and tightens the cap proposed by the European Commission to 4.27 per cent for biodiesel produced from oil crops. International land use modelling has provided a wide range of results and the NFU believes the EU Commission has chosen one modelling result, which includes some basic errors that bias results against biodiesel, on which to base its proposal. NFU crops board member Brett Askew said: “The consequences of this for arable production could be devastating and a further blow to UK and EU agriculture, with an estimated reduction of one-third in the cropped area of EU and UK oilseed rape and the impact of losing an important rotational crop on UK wheat yields. “It is clear Ms Lepage has failed to consider the severe implications of her opinion on productivity and biodiversity on-farm. Picking winners, as she has done in proposing a cap on biodiesel production, fails to reflect the interdependence of these feedstocks on-farm.” Mr Askew said the decision to introduce ILUC factors to control a ‘hypothetical conflict of food versus fuel naively confuses two issues of agricultural production and the original ILUC greenhouse gas savings’. “This simplistic approach fails to reflect the factors behind increasing production on farm, for all markets,” he added. “Simply destroying demand will not lead to an increase in future stock levels but instead a decline in production as markets correct themselves to reflect economic supply and demand levels.” Continue reading
Biofuels Can Play A Part In Strengthening UK Economy
10 May 2013 THE NFU believes the motivation behind encouraging arable farmers to produce should not confuse two issues of producing maize for anaerobic digestion (AD) and wheat or oilseed rape to be used in biofuel production (FG, May 3). On-farm decisions are driven by access to markets. Removing the ability of farmers to add value to basic commodities through biofuel production or AD would not simply result in the same level of production of wheat for animal feed. Instead, the likelihood is farmers will reduce production as it becomes economically unsustainable. Biofuels and other forms of bioenergy production have the ability to reduce the UK’s reliance on both imported fuel and animal feed. The agricultural community can play a part in limiting the exposure of the UK economy to the vagaries of world energy and protein prices. Dr Jonathan Scurlock, NFU chief adviser on renewable energy and climate change. Continue reading
Agriculture Minister: 5 bln Euros In EU Funds Effectively Enter Romanian Beneficiaries’ Accounts
Tuesday, May 14, 2013 Romania has so far drawn nearly 5 billion euros worth of the European Union funds earmarked under the National Rural Development Programme, with such money having effectively entered the beneficiaries’ accounts and having been repaid by the European Commission, Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development Daniel Constantin told AGERPRES in an interview on Monday. ‘Last year, the absorption under the National Rural Development Programme amounted to 3.7 billion euros and today it has reached 5 billion euros. We’ve recorded 1.3 billion euros increase over a year and I think it is a significant increase, for only one programme, the more so since the money has been paid the beneficiaries and repaid by the European Commission to Romania’, Constantin stressed. He underscored that his ministry, last year, managed to get an additional 100 million euros, given that the Romanian agriculture was hit by a droughty span and 6 billion lei was injected via the Agriculture Payments Agency. ‘We managed to get an additional 100 million euros to the ministry budget last year, an unprecedented fact since 1989. The Government has proved it is concerned with the agriculture not only when harvesting the crops, there are collections to the budget and we have economic growth. The fact we gave 100 million euros in a year when we did not have a very good crop was a very good signal for me, I think, but for the farmers first and foremost. This year we finalised all the payments via the Payments Agency in only two months, namely March and April, which means there was an inflow of six billion lei to the Romanian farming, although I would say it was to the Romanian economy, because such an amount was invested and bolstered the consumption and also the payment of taxes and duties to the budget. If things look well now, it is also due to the money inflow via the Payments Agency. It is for the first time that the Agency manages to pay all the funds it had available so fast’, Constantin explained. According to figures supplied by the Agency for Rural Development and Fisheries Payments (ADFP), European funds for investment projects amounting to 17.92 billion euros had been claimed by end-April, with around 141,000 projects having been filed. The funds committed via the National Rural Development Programme for the rural area’s development total 5.21 billion euros, while there are as many as 65,193 contracted projects for being financed by EU funds. As much as 4.94 billion euros has entered the beneficiaries’ accounts, with 2.78 billion euros of it being for investment projects and 2.16 billion euros for the compensatory payments made by the ADFP. Continue reading
