Use of food crops for biofuels will worsen Africa 's food problems, says Pachauri

Addis Ababa, 1 April 2008 (ECA) -- Conversion of food crops into biofuels is a serious mistake which will aggravate Africa's food insecurity, Dr. Rajendra Pachauri, Chair of the Nobel Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), said in Addis Ababa yesterday as the joint Economic Commission of Africa/African Union (ECA/AU) ministerial conference enters its high level segment.

In an address titled “The Challenge of Climate Change in Africa” Dr. Pachauri, who is also the Director-General of The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), said rather than convert food crops into biofuels, countries should increase the cultivation of non-food crops such as Jatropha, which is cultivated in many African countries, including Mali, for biodiesel.

Climate change will impede nations' abilities to achieve sustainable development pathways and adversely impact basic needs such as food, health and security of settlement, said Pachauri.

He said climate change would likely reduce the length of growing seasons and force large regions of marginal agriculture out of production. Accordingly, yield in some African countries could reduce by 50 per cent by 2020 while wheat production would disappear from Africa by the 2080s, said Dr. Pachauri.

He said climate change would also alter the ecology of some disease vectors, increasing by 5-7 percent the distribution of malaria in Africa by 2100 and increasing the likelihood of epidemics due to the lack of protective genetic modifications in the newly affected populations.

To mitigate some of these impacts, Pachauri called for a new development paradigm which would stabilize the climate as well as adaptation and mitigation strategies which would increase income levels, education and technical skills for improving disaster preparedness and management and improving health care systems.

He also called for further examination of the vulnerabilities and impacts of future climate change, especially on infectious diseases, the incorporation of indigenous knowledge into climate change policies, mainstreaming of adaptation strategies into national development processes and better south-south cooperation.

After the address, the ECA's Executive-Secretary Abdoulie Janneh signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Pachauri regarding the establishment of the African Climate Policy Centre at the ECA headoffice in Addis Ababa .