Page 2 of 2 THE ROVING
EYE What drives biofuel
Bush? By Pepe Escobar
model for the whole regional
ethanol boom - US capital mixed with Brazilian
technology profiting from a cheap local workforce.
Inevitably, the ethanol boom also fits the
pattern of Latin America - in US hegemonic
conception - as a mere "back yard", our
"neighborhood" (a favorite Bushism) historically
adept at providing fabulous natural resources,
slave or semi-slave labor, strategic
outposts, and markets
(including financial) for US oligarchies.
No wonder US hedge funds and investment
banks, as well as the Sao Paulo agribusiness
bourgeoisie, are pouring the champagne. What
Brazilian producers actually want, medium-term, is
not so far-fetched: a hemisphere-wide E10 brand of
gasoline (blended with 10% ethanol).
So
the alliances are on the table. In the US, it's
the corn-producing Midwest against
sugarcane-producing Florida, and ultimately George
W Bush against a protectionist Congress. In
Brazil, it's Jeb Bush and US investors, allied
with Brazilian agribusiness, against the Chavez
"threat".
In a rally in front of 40,000
people in a soccer stadium in Buenos Aires last
Friday night - parallel to Bush having a steak
dinner in Montevideo, across the Rio de la Plata -
Chavez stressed the "folly to plant so much corn
and sugarcane not to feed humans but to sustain
the American way of life". So - in Bush family
business thinking - it's Chavez' oil-fueled
Bolivarian Revolution against the new Green Saudi
Arabia (Brazil). Or is it? Totally absent from the
Chavez demonization show is always the fact that
what he is doing in Venezuela is to redistribute
oil wealth, land and local and regional power -
anathema to US conservatives and right-wingers as
well as to the greedy, arrogant Latin American
white oligarchies, Brazilians included.
Green Saudi Arabia? The
merciless spin in the new Green Saudi Arabia - by
Bush and Brazilian Bush family allies - is that
ethanol is cleaner than oil, more sustainable and
anti-global warming. It's not that simple.
Scientists point out that biofuels are not
necessarily environment-friendly. For example,
palm-oil bio-diesel cultivation in Southeast Asia
is increasing carbon emissions. Biofuel production
on a very large scale emits a lot of carbon
dioxide and involves herbicides, pesticides and
fertilizers - all petroleum-based.
It also
requires a lot of water. In the case of Sao Paulo
state in Brazil, where it rains a lot, this is not
a problem. Moreover, southern Brazil holds immense
underground water reserves.
Brazil plants
sugarcane far away from the Amazon rainforest: 80%
in the center to south of the country (60% in
wealthy Sao Paulo state, the center of this energy
boom). The remaining 20% of plantations are on the
northeast coast. The environmental threat by the
sugar-ethanol industry is actually to the
beautiful Pantanal wetlands. In the case of
Malaysia and Indonesia - which want massive export
of bio-diesel made from palm oil to the European
Union - virgin rainforest inevitably will be
devastated: at least 20 million hectares in
Indonesia will be razed for new oil-palm
plantations.
The unsung heroes of Green
Saudi Arabia are the cortadores de cana -
sugarcane cutters - a migrant army of at least
200,000 workers who fled the almost Sahara-like
Brazilian northeast. They work for a minimum of 12
hours a day under relentless, scorching
30-degree-Celsius temperatures to earn less than
$200 a month, living in precarious conditions in
crowded guesthouses charging a fortune for rent.
It's this unsung army who will allow
Brazil to reach ethanol exports of 200 billion
liters by 2025, with sugarcane plantations
spreading from 6 million to 30 million hectares.
The army will grow exponentially. In Florida it's
not that much different - as in Alligator Alley
west of the I95 highway: the slaves in this case
are Jamaicans and the landowners are Cuban sugar
kings very cozy with Jeb Bush.
In the US,
Corn Belt farmers - and their congressmen - are
the great profiteers of the biofuel boom, as well
as corn brokers and refineries. In Brazil - with
the lowest cost of production in the world for the
sugar industry - profits for Sugar Daddies are
even more spectacular. In Sao Paulo, the cost of
production is $165 per ton; in Western Europe it
is $700 per ton. Large US and European
corporations such as French Tereos and US-based
Cargill are on a merger-and-acquisition frenzy all
over Sao Paulo state, snatching every sugar mill
they can find.
Diversification rules. Oil
is a thing of the past. Jeb Bush and his Brazilian
Green Sheikh pals are in to make a lot of money.
And for a bit of R&R, retired George W can
always count on the 100,000-hectare ranch daughter
Barbara bought last year in the Paraguayan
chaco. It may not be the green, green grass
of home, but it certainly beats Fallujah.
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