Feijão reduz custo de cana (OESP)

Portuguese story available here.
The Agribusiness Technology São Paulo Agency (Agência Paulista de Tecnologia dos Agronegócios, APTA), Ribeirão Preto chapter, is conducting a research to plant eight types of beans between the sugar cane lines. Not only this is brings another wealth source to the producer but at the same time it raises the food production.
Mr. [...]

EU and Brazil join forces over biofuels (The Guardian)

EU leaders are concerned about an ethanol production that meets environmental, labour and social standards, according to this story by The Guardian.
It is a good picture for Brazil and other poor and developing countries in Central America, the Caribbean and Africa, according to President Lula from Brazil. In Brazil thebiofuels allowed a 40% reduction of [...]

O Economicismo Talibã (Época Negócios)

Quick interview with the minister for agricultural development, in which he defends the Brazilian government program that joins social and economical goals under the biodiesel program.

Arbitragem no Consecana (Folha de São Paulo)

The former minister of agriculture, mr Roberto Rodrigues, gave an unusual perspective for today’s ethanol and sugar sector in Brazil.

Biodiesel in Brazil (Tendências Consultoria)

This is just a press release, since I can’t find the original study. But first, a little background.
Most of Brazil’s cargo system is made by trucks. Its roots are from President Juscelino Kubitschek’s development program, which opted for a automobile industry. Instead of building tracks and trains, Brazil chose highways in the late 1950’s.
Today, not [...]

Lean, green and not mean (The Economist)

Pedro Doria today drew my attention to an interesting article that outlines a few pros and cons of Brazilian ethanol. I already left a comment there but I also decided to write here. Cutting to the chase:

The petrol prices in Brazil haven’t seen a raise for the past three years. A side effect is that [...]

Drivers of Food Price Increases: Is it fair to blame biofuels? (New Energy Finance)

Again, the food vs. fuel debate. I consider this as a very important issue, since the poor suffer a lot more even from slight changes on food prices.
“Drivers of Food Price Increases: Is it fair to blame biofuels?” (from New Energy Finance) is a study to which I haven’t had full access. However, after reading [...]

It’s Corn vs. Soybeans in a Biofuels Debate (NY Times)

Original article here.
The study cited on this story affirms that the fuel vs. food debate is something we should be concerned about. Indeed, as we previously saw here, most of the current generation of biofuels under production in the US is based on transforming corn grain in ethanol, or soybean in biodiesel. Always good to [...]

Getting Serious About Biofuels (Science)

The author, Steven Koonin, points out several important issues for developing the biofuels and making them a globally viable solution to the energy issue. (As he well observes at the footnote, “Brazil is a singular counterexample, where favorable agricultural conditions and a flexible processing infrastructure allow the majority of the country’s road transport to be [...]