Rice Urges Central American Countries to Switch to BioFuel

On her recent trip to Panama, Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice along with Brazilian government officials promoted the use of biofuels in Central American and Caribbean countries. According to the U.S. State Department's western hemisphere website, Rice and the Brazilian officials singled out El Salvador, Haiti, the Dominican Republic, and St. Kitts as four nations that are 90% or more dependent on foreign oil imports for every type of energy production, including electricity.

Life-threatening disruptions in energy production have occurred when there have been shortages or crises in the Middle East. Meanwhile, these nations already grow plentiful crops such as sugar cane that could be used for biofuel production. Brazil has been developing sugar cane-based biofuels, and wants to share that technology with these countries. The net effect would be less dependence on foreign oil imports from unstable regions of the world such as the Middle East.

Rice said, "We seek to promote the democratization of energy in the Americas, increasing the number of energy suppliers, expanding the market and reducing supply disruption." Brazil and the United States are the world's two largest ethanol producers. A State Department energy specialist, Matthew McManus, said "We hope they can grow a significant portion of energy they consume." He said the focus of the U.S.-Brazil project is the creation of biofuels for local use.

McManus also said that private investment would be the key to this initiative working. Brazilian companies have already invested in El Salvador and Jamaica, and seen some positive results. But Haiti and the Dominican Republic would need to make some legal changes to make private-sector commerce in this area possible and protected. These four countries are "trial" countries that the United States and Brazil want to focus on before expanding the initiative further.

Besides decreased oil dependence, another positive result would be a cleaner atmosphere. Biofuels and ethanol burn more cleanly than fossil fuels, and using biofuels would help these developping countries cut down on greenhouse gas emissions in a part of the world where those emissions are highest -- the developping world.

Rice was in Latin America for the 37th annual meeting of the Organization of American States (OAS), held in Panama City, Panama. The OAS released a statement on June 5 saying that biofuels are "critical to diversifying the use of energy" in the region. Developping nations in Latin America are some of the most oil-dependent nations in the world. They have no oil of their own, so they are also import-dependent, mostly from the unstable Middle East.

Sources:

"United States, Brazil Seek a Central America Driven by Biofuels," U.S. State Department "The Americas" Website, URL: http://usinfo.state.gov/wh/