CEU Electronic Theses and Dissertations, 2008
| Author | Silvestri, Luciana Carla |
|---|---|
| Title | The Bitter Sweet Promise of Biofuels Sweet for few, bitter for many: A study case of Honduras |
| Summary | Today, biofuels emerge in forms that can offer some unique opportunities to help combating climate change, while coping with emerging energy crisis and promoting rural development for millions of rural poor who could benefit from this new development. Rural opportunities are expected to occur through: a) the generation of new employment and income opportunities and increased capital turnovers, b) the chance to advance a critical production input, i.e. energy, to other rural enterprises, and c) the possibility to facilitate Millennium Development Goals’ (MDGs) achievement. Honduras, as many other countries where biomass growing potential exists, has been attracted by the above-mentioned opportunities and consequently, launched an aggressive “mega agro-industrial biofuels initiative” in early 2006. Through this plan, the government seeks foremost to advance rural development through the creation of new jobs opportunities for millions of rural poor, and to a certain extent to reduce its total dependency on expensive imported oil. To reach these goals, the Government plans to develop its African palm oil based biodiesel potential. Nevertheless, these opportunities are not straightforward. Moreover, the net balance of such biofuels development could even be negative for local communities and the environment as biofuels production can also serve to threaten food security and could contribute to vulnerable communities’ displacement, to ecosystems degradation and to soils and water impacts, etc. As a result, it is pertinent to ask: “are biofuels actually a good idea at all?” Through an analysis of available secondary data and of stakeholders’ perspectives, this study seeks to understand the opportunities and challenges that palm oil based biodiesel offers to rural poor in Honduras. The study concludes that potential opportunities palm oil based biodiesel could offer to rural poor communities in Honduras are unlikely to happen. Even though new employment opportunities are likely to occur, these do not seem to have a significant impact on poverty alleviation. On the one hand, smallholders’ benefits from palm cultivation seem to be marginal, temporary and highly dependent on external factors. Even more to the point, it is unlikely biodiesel production help boost traditional rural economy and/or help advance MDGs achievement as produced biodiesel will not remain in the rural areas. On the other hand, it was found that palm oil based biodiesel is likely to worsen already insecure food context, to trigger sporadic forced population displacements, to negatively impact on soils and water quality and to exacerbate ecosystems degradation processes. Therefore, the present study found that palm oil based biodiesel production in Honduras is not such a good idea as it seems at a first glance. |
| Supervisor | Peck Philip |
| Department | Environment Sciences and Policy MSc |
| Full text | https://www.etd.ceu.edu/2008/silvestri_luciana.pdf |
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