Biofuels "Crime Against Humanity"

Every five seconds a child under ten dies from hunger or disease related to malnutrition and there are 854 million hungry people in the world.

Last month I asked when we were going to begin getting a proper sense of perspective on questions surrounding biofuels, food security and the environment. At last, people appear to have taken notice:

Earlier this month, the UN special rapporteur on the right to food, Jean Ziegler described current approaches to biofuels as "a total disaster for those who are starving."

Last week, in its October 2007 World Economic Outlook, the International Monetary Fund voiced concern that the increasing global reliance on grain as a source of fuel could have serious implications for the world's poor.

Earlier this week, in the Parliamentary debate to establish the first fixed targets for biofuels, the Shadow Minister for Transport, Julian Brazier warned, "If biofuels are to play a successful part in the fight against climate change, it is absolutely vital that they come from sustainable sources. Without clear and binding rules on sustainability, this proposal could damage the environment not protect it. It would be madness if UK biofuel targets actively encouraged people to rip up the rainforest."

Now, the UN's Jean Ziegler has described the conversion of food crops to fuel as a "crime against humanity" and has called for a five-year moratorium on biofuels. He suggests the ban would allow scientists to develop ways to make biofuels from other crops without diverting land from food production, such as a pilot project in India using trees planted in arid areas unsuitable for food crops. He also criticised European governments for choosing a military response to those fleeing famine and chronic hunger from sub-Saharan Africa and wants a new human right to be created in favour of these "refugees from hunger."

Let us hope good sense will prevail over the economic interests of the climate change lobby.

Bank of the South

"Sooner or later, those institutions will fall due to their own weight. They will wear away, the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and all those institutions. We're better off without the Fund and without the World Bank."

So the Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez has told a meeting of Latin American leaders. Mr Chávez says he wants to formalise his country's exit from the World Bank and IMF and is developing an alternative economic vision for the continent called the Bolivarian Alternative for the Americas (ALBA) to rival the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) being championed by the United States.

Following the precedent set by the Bolivian President Evo Morales, who nationalised his country's natural gas industry last year, Mr Chávez has this week taken control of Venezuela's last oil field projects that were still being run by foreign companies, which will increase his ability to provide alternative forms of credit and financial support for other countries in the region. The foreign firms, which include Britain's BP, are more than likely to remain involved, in part because of the significant investment that they have already put into the projects and in part because the country's Orinoco River basin is the world's largest known oil deposit, holding a possible 1.2 trillion barrels of extra-heavy crude, rivalling even Saudi Arabia's reserves.

Venezuela's share of the IMF is apparently worth $3.9 billion, although it is not clear how much money the fund or the World Bank might have to return to Caracas. One can't but be reminded of another intergovernmental giant and refrains of "Better off out!"

IMF Hinders African Progress

An average of just 30 pence in every pound of foreign aid increases to Sub-Saharan African countries can be spent because the International Monetary Fund requires governments under its supervision to redirect the use of foreign aid increases to either boost international currency reserves or to pay down domestic debt.

This is the shock finding reported by the IMF's Independent Evaluation Office in meetings today and directly undermines Africa's fight against AIDS, illiteracy, and hunger.

Now, the IMF is not an independent body. It is an intergovernmental body. That means the governments responsible for approving an increase in their foreign aid budgets are also the ones responsible for deciding IMF policy. Our charitable leaders are therefore giving with one hand, only to take away with the other ... behind our backs. So much for the exhortation to "Let your giving be in secret" – the Western world's leaders have paraded their giving (and, even more so, their unfulfilled promises of giving) but hidden the fact that they've not been as generous after all.