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Can wildlife survive the biofuels surge?

Little bustard (male) in Spanish meadow
Set-aside was important for declining European farmland birds like little bustards

The biofuels rush is contributing to the loss of natural habitats around the world.

In some areas, extensively farmed lands with wildlife-friendly features are being converted to more intensive farming for biofuel crops. In other areas, valuable natural ecosystems such as forests, peatlands and grasslands are being cleared, drained and ploughed up to grow biofuels.

Wonderful places for wildlife are being made into wastelands for wildlife.

Brazilian government efforts to protect the forest are undermined by pressure by farmers to cash in on high soya prices

Brazil and Paraguay's Cerrado, the world's most wildlife-rich savannah, is one special place under threat from crop expansion. Some 90,000 insect, 40,000 fungi, 550 bird and 150 mammal species have been recorded in the Cerrado.

But a Conservation International (CI) study says that large-scale soybean farms, sugar plantations and cattle pasture are destroying the area. One reason for the sugar and soya expansion is to produce raw materials for biofuels. CI says that, at current rates of loss, the Cerrado will be gone by 2030.

In the Amazon rainforests, a similar picture unfolds. Even as the rainforests continue to reveal astonishing new species, an area equivalent to the size of Jamaica is felled every year (WRI). Brazilian government efforts to protect the forest are undermined by pressure by farmers to cash in on high soya prices.

Soya prices are rising internationally because less soya is being produced in the United States - as a result, Brazilian farmers can make lucrative earnings. U.S. farmers are switching from soya to maize at least in part to cash in on the maize-for-bioethanol boom, which is subsidised by the U.S. government.

Oil palm expansion has already eradicated vast tracts of forest in Malaysia, much of it used in foods, cosmetics and as cooking oil. Now the surging global demand for palm oil, only made worse by governments' targets for biofuels use, has put extra pressure on south-east Asian producers to deliver.

Wildlife already under threat

Indonesia recently overtook Malaysia as the world's top palm oil producer and its wildlife is already under severe threat, especially those endangered species hanging on in the last fragments of lowland forest.

Most of Indonesia's palm oil is produced on the vast western island of Sumatra where most of the lowland forest has now been cleared. Twenty eight of Sumatra’s forest-dependent bird species are globally threatened with extinction and have few other refuges beyond Sumatra’s forests, should they disappear.

In Europe, set-aside land was historically an important feeding and nesting resource for many farmland birds that are in severe decline, such as the little bustard and grey partridge.

Recently, set-aside land has been lost because of the demand to grow cereal crops. Farmers could already plant industrial crops such as biofuels on set-aside, and an increasing number were choosing to do so. Biofuels opportunities and a poor global harvest together led to increased demand for cereal crops - and the political decision to fast-track the abolition of set-aside.

The European drive for bioenergy production, generally, is increasing the pressure to intensify crop production and to bring grasslands into cultivation. The ploughing up of permanent grasslands in Germany to grow corn for biofuels means the loss of a species-rich habitat.

A call for sustainability standards

The RSPB wants UK and European decision-makers to commit to strong sustainability standards on all biofuels sold, to ensure the fuels haven’t been produced at the expense of wildlife habitat. 

Until such standards are in place and can be met, we want UK plans to introduce biofuels into the UK fuel supply to be shelved and  are calling for a moratorium on any higher biofuels targets in Europe. 

Such safeguards are the only way to protect space for wildlife in a land-hungry world.

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Last modified: 14 April 2008