Liberian president 'aware' of land grabbing complaints

Liberian president Ellen Johnson Sirleaf is generally treated as democratic hero who has brought a measure of stability and the beginnings of post-war development to her country. In 2011, just before an election that won her a second term, she was the joint recipient of a Nobel Peace Prize.

But her tenure has gradually been dogged by controversy, including charges of nepotism after she appointed three of her sons to senior government positions, and rumours of corruption..  

Also increasingly controversial has been the growing perception that Sirleaf's government doles out agro-forestry concessions to foreign firms too freely, and that the agreed conditions greatly disadvantage local communities.

Touted by the government as an important element of post-war recovery and development, critics fear that the land leases and local disgruntlement could be creating the conditions for future conflict. Some activists say up to a third of the country's land mass has been leased to investors for logging, plantations and mining.  

During an address in London, England in October, Sirleaf said her government was aware of the complainst and would be reviewing the lease agreements.

African Agriculture

Malaysian palm oil investment in Liberia causes dislocation crisis

It's now an almost boringly familiar story: the central government negotiates to lease huge chunks of fertile countryside to a foreign investor who promises to bring 'develoment,' jobs and many other benefits. Local communities are told little about the land giveaways until they are displaced. Few jobs or other benefits materialize for the locals and resentment sets in.

In this case its about a Malaysian company developing palm oil plantations in Liberia.  

'Angry villagers accuse Sime Darby of cutting a private deal with the government and failing to consult them. Last December, they rioted against the company, seizing its bulldozers and blocking the plantation project. They say their crops are gone and their sacred lands are desecrated. The jobs, they say, are too few and too poorly paid, especially now that they’re forced to buy their food in the marketplace rather than growing it.'

“Everybody made mistakes on this,” Liberian President Ellen Sirleaf Johnson told the villagers. “More consultations and more talks with the people should have taken place.”

Considering all the publicity about how frequently these sort of "mistakes" have happened in so many other places before, this sounds pathetically weak coming from the Liberian president. 

While dispossessed farmers are clearly victims, that does not necessarily mean they are innocents in the matter. Lump some payments that were offered and eagerly accepted seemed like a fortune "until the money runs out and they realize they’ve got nothing to fall back on."

One farmer was paid $130 for his two acre farm. We are told he is now contract worker for the palm oil plantation, 'getting 3 cents for every hole that he digs for a palm seedling.' Not only is his income now less than what he is said to have earned before, his loss is far more than just financial. 

Blame poverty, lack of education. But where was the government when its citizens were giving away their heritage for a few pieces of silver? Obviously too busy doing deals with the investor to think of more robust protections for its citizens in signing these deals.


Calling it a "mistake" sounds awfully hollow of the Liberian president.

 African Agriculture

Herakles' palm oil plantation in Cameroon: progress or a disaster waiting to happen?

by Chido Makunike

Cameroon's location in the heart of the central African tropics makes it ideal for palm oil cultivation. Not surprisingly, the new rush by foreign investors for African agricultural land has not left fertile, lush Cameroon unaffected.

An excellent July 18 Reuters special report  highlights some, but far from all, of the reasons the new wave of foreign investments in African farm land are so controversial.

World demand for palm oil has doubled since 2000, we are told, and farming it in the traditional Asian growing countries (Indonesia, Malaysia) has increased challenges and costs. So investors are increasingly looking to central Africa.

Herakles Farms, owned by New York venture-finance firm Herakles Capital, is one of many investors with plans for huge palm oil holdings in Cameroon. As with all such investments, they promise Cameroonians 'steady work, roads and health care.'  

But not everyone is jumping up with joy at the Herakles investment. The concerns expressed are now familiar to anyone who has kept up with the land investment rush in recent years. There are allegations of traditional and government leaders doing shady deals behind the backs of the people they lead, fears of displacement and loss of livelihood; and there is also scepticism about the various benefits promised. Will the jobs and other social benefits promised be equal to or exceed the resource-mining, the permanent changes to the society? Without details (and monitoring) of the promised 'steady work, roads and healthcare,' it is impossible to say. 

Herakles is also accused of being under-handed in various ways in how it solicited local community input about its investment plans.


The article depressingly shows that despite years of heated debate about the pros and cons of these large-scale farming investments, very few of the main reasons for conflict have been dealt with by governments or investors.

For the investors, doing business with strong-arm governments that have little regard for the opinions of their people buys them a sort of 'stability' in often socio-politically volatile investing environments. Yet the times have changed to a more open, informed era in which it is no longer quite as easy as before to repress people with complete impunity. Even where government guns can keep a sullen, unhappy population under control, for investors there is now a considerable potential financial and reputational cost to being seen to be in bed with governments that neither respect nor represent their people well.

One fear expressed by some of the locals is that the proposed new Herakles palm oil plantation ("over 60,000 hectares of land - 10 times the size of Manhattan") will remove from community use one of the few remaining areas suitable for viable food cropping. Will 20, 30 or 40 years of mostly low-wage 'steady work' compensate for this kind of loss?

Speaking of steady wage-labour, which are the kind of low-range jobs that will be mostly on offer, it is a toss up whether such jobs mean an overall improvement in the livelihoods of the workers concerned, and of the communities. When the workers have these tenuous low-wage jobs as well as access to their traditional farmlands for the rest of their families to continue to work, it could be argued that the long-term security and earnings synergy of the  two income streams does indeed lead to greater security.

The lack of much of a cash economy in remote, poorly developed rural areas often wins the day in the argument over whether to allow/welcome investments such as that proposed by Herakles. The attitude is 'any jobs/steady income is better than subsistence farming.'  But if an extended family is giving up their ancestral land (the source of food security, cultural grounding, 'belonging,' independence, etc) for one or a handful of its members to have wages, the net gain is highly debatable.

But a huge investment such as that proposed by Herakles will act as an anchor for other kinds of investment in the area, won't it, increasing job opportunities and general economic prospects, won't it? Not necessarily, and certainly not automatically. In the absence of a dedicated plan to lure accompanying services to the area, those 'new opportunities' that will spring up on their own are likely to be brothels, bars and so forth. Single large agricultural or mining investors that come to dominate an area have proven this general rule all over Africa, and many places elsewhere.

When the large extractive investor pulls out for whatever reason, even  after a decades-long presence, there is often pitifully no long term 'development' left behind. Where there hasn't been a long-term plan between the area-dominant investor and the government, not only does the 'steady work' evaporate, so do the means/resources to keep the local school and clinic running. In addition, the environmental mess and the social and cultural dislocation is often such that the community can no longer simply resort to their previous subsistence agricultural existence. 

This is the reality of many similar investments all over Africa. One would have hoped that all these previous experiences would inform the discussion between Herakles and the Cameroonian government, but there is little indication that this is in fact the case, at least from reading the Reuters article.

The main investment driver's stated motivations are fascinating to hear.   
Bruce Wrobel, chief executive of Herakles Farms, is not the stereotypical culturally deaf and blind foreign investor who cares about nothing else as long as he has the minister or president's signature/protection.   

Reuters tell us that, "Since a 1999 visit to West Africa during the civil wars of Sierra Leone and Liberia, Wrobel's aim has been to mix business with philanthropy in order to assist the continent." 

Wrobel's do-gooder credentials are further bolstered by how he 'helped cut telephone costs for millions of East Africans, he says, via his fiber-optic cable joint venture Seacom. A hydro plant run by his Sithe Global Power company in Uganda has reduced power blackouts there.'

But all this impressive 'helping' that he has done was in the course of doing business for profit, which is fine, even good; certainly much better than the unsustainable, unsuccessful brand of aid-based do-goodism that has been inflicted on Africa for decades now. Where governments are alert and responsive to their people's needs, for-profit investment certainly has much more potential to be harnessed into long-term development than aid-based 'projects.'

Strangely, Wrobel out seems to be conflicted about whether he wants to do ethical for-profit business in Cameroon, or whether he is primarily going there is a Peace Corp worker.    

Listen to this mushy mumbo jumbo from Wrobel: "Our big concern is that over a relatively short period of time there will be no way for the African consumer to compete with the Chinese and the Indian buyer. That could lead to some of the types of instability and food riots that we saw a few years back."

Wrobel may well be a genuinely good guy who is sincere in his do-gooder rhetoric. But part of the history of the foreign exploitation of Africa over the last 100 years or so is that very often, the exploiters have claimed to be motivated by pity for Africans. It is tired, it is old, and it is increasingly met with suspicion.

If Wrobel really wants to show a new model of ethical farming investment at a time of growing scepticism, the best way he can do so is by practically showing that his Cameroonian palm oil venture has thought about and is addressing the many doubts and worries about such enterprises.  

 African Agriculture

 

Palm oil need not harm environment or local communities, finds study

The exponential growth in the palm oil sector, which accounts for a third of the total global trade of 130 million tons of vegetable oil annually, is strongly challenged by indigenous peoples and civil society organisations. Indiscriminate land clearing and acquisition for oil palm plantations is resulting in rapid habitat loss, species extinctions and alarming greenhouse gas emissions. It has also led to the dispossession of both indigenous peoples and the rural poor who depend traditionally on forest habitats for their survival.

With the global biofuel industry set to double between 2007-2017, the choices nations make today will have far reaching social, economic and environmental consequences. This new study by Forest Peoples Programme, SawitWatch, Samdhana Institute and RECOFTC - The Center for People and Forests, documents for the first time the various ways in which oil palm plantations are expanding across South East Asia.
The study complements the better known experiences in Malaysia, Indonesia and Papua New Guinea – the region’s top three producers accounting for over 80% of traded palm oil - with new case studies from Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam and the Philippines.

“What we have found,” notes Abetnego Tarigan, Executive Director of the Indonesian NGO SawitWatch is that “while expansion is in part being driven by rising global demand for edible oils and biofuels, as well as escalating commodity prices and surging international investment, domestic policies are also significant. Governments are promoting oil palm to meet rising domestic demand for edible oils, to reduce their countries’ dependency on imported fossil fuels and to limit their loss of foreign exchange. In doing so, they need to take responsibility for the impacts of their domestic policies.”

James Bampton, Program Coordinator for RECOFTC – The Center for People and Forests, based in Bangkok notes: “Oil palm need not be bad news for local people. After all, it has been part of mixed farming systems in West Africa for thousands of years. This study shows that where the circumstances are favourable, as in Thailand where lowland farmers, have relatively secure rights, they themselves are choosing to plant oil palm as a lucrative crop.”

The study, titled Oil Palm Expansion in South East Asia: trends and implications for local communities and indigenous peoples, edited by Marcus Colchester and Sophie Chao, shows that the consequences of oil palm expansion for local communities and indigenous peoples are extremely varied: “When we compared the national experiences with palm oil” says Marcus Colchester, Director of the Forest Peoples Programme, “We found that where farmers’ and indigenous peoples’ lands are secure and where there is rule of law, oil palm tends to develop modestly as a small-holder crop with better outcomes for local people in terms of income, equity and livelihoods. However, where land rights are insecure or law enforcement weak, oil palm tends to expand as very large company-owned estates with serious problems for prior occupants and workers, ensuing land conflicts and human rights abuse.”

“The implications of our findings are very clear” notes Nonette Royo of the Samdhana Institute based in the Philippines: “To ensure that oil palm only develops in beneficial ways, governments need to reform their laws and then enforce them so that local peoples’ rights are first respected and then protected. Without such protections, expansion is likely to benefit investors, traders and national elites at the expense of the rural poor and vulnerable ecosystems.”

The report presents case studies from across the region to back its policy recommendations as well as an assessment of the Round Table on Sustainable Oil, the premier agency tasked with minimizing the environmental and social impacts of rising regional palm oil consumption.

To download the report visit: http://www.forestpeoples.org/oil-palm-expansion-in-south-east-asia-trends-implications-local-communities-indigenous-peoples

Tempers rise in Sierra Leone over palm oil 'investments' to some, 'land grabs' to others

by Simon Akam

In a remote corner of Sierra Leone, signs of a bonanza are evident. New corrugated zinc roofs have replaced simple thatch on houses, motorbikes ply the streets and market stalls are well-stocked.
The new wealth of the villagers in Pujehun district is thanks to a land lease deal with a European investor for an oil palm plantation that has backing from the national government in Freetown right down to the local "paramount chief."

But not everybody is happy.

"The chief brought the company here. He is the one supposed for talk to us," 28-year-old Eddie Amara, who led local protests against the project last month, said in hesitant English in the village of Kortumahun.
"He's not treat us good, fair," said Amara, adding that pledges of local employment had yet to fully materialize and giving voice to local claims that villagers felt they had little choice but to hand over land.

The Sierra Leone plantation of Lichtenstein-based Socfin is one of many such projects in Africa, spurred by global demand for food and biofuel but criticized by some as "land grabs."

Police arrested 39 local people in last month's protests, and the row has become a political hot potato. A German aid group withdrew one of its workers from Sierra Leone earlier this year following a dispute over the case.

The saga highlights the tensions surfacing as Africa is drawn further into the global economy, triggering hope that the continent's people will one day benefit but also concern that precious local resources will be lost with little gain.

The U.N.'s Food and Agriculture office last month warned African governments not to rush into big land lease deals for risk of deepening poverty or heightening social tensions.

Sierra Leone is one of the world's poorest countries and desperately needs foreign investment. Pujehun District suffered heavily during Sierra Leone's 1991-2002 civil war, a conflict that left some 50,000 dead.


The Socfin deal was completed earlier this year. The Sierra Leonean government leased land from local landowners, and the company in turn has its own lease with the government. It is adamant that the project is a win-win proposition.

"You cannot start a project like this in Africa against the will of the people," said Gerben Haringsma, general manager of Socfin Agricultural Company Sierra Leone Ltd.

"When there is no harmony there is no profit," adding that if all goes well the initial stage of the project will stretch to a total 12,500 hectares and could be expanded further to include rubber cultivation.

The project currently employs 1,500 Africans, many on a temporary basis and not all of them locals. When production begins, the headcount is due to rise to 3,000. The daily rate is $2.30. That compares to Sierra Leone's national income of $340 a head, as measured on the World Bank's Atlas scale -- just under a dollar a day.

The row has been fueled by the fact that in Sierra Leone, as in other African countries, there is an uneasy co-existence of traditional chiefdom structures with Western-style government that has muddied key issues such as land ownership.

Local paramount chief Brima Victor Sedi Kebbie has championed the deal in contrast to the local member of parliament who opposes it. People in Malen chiefdom accuse Kebbie of having pressurised them into giving up their land.

"The chief said whether you agree or don't agree they will take the plantation by force," said Brima Lappia, a 42-year-old from the village of Semabu who chairs an association recently formed by disgruntled landowners.

Kebbie was not in the area and did not reply to messages left on his phone. His deputy, "chiefdom speaker" Shemgbe Robert Moiguah, strongly defends the deal. "If we know it cannot develop our people, we would not go in for it," he said.

A 2004 government document stipulates that land in provincial areas is "held in communal ownership under customary tenure and is controlled by traditional rulers who administer it on behalf of their communities in accordance with customary principles and usage."

However, Francis Sankoh, director of Sierra Leone's ministry of agriculture, said that does not give paramount chiefs the right to force farmers to give up their land.

"They are not supposed to. It is not in the laws of Sierra Leone," he said.

A particular bone of contention is the compensation the company is paying for crops destroyed when they took over land. Locals rejected an initial offer of 500,000 leones per acre but later accepted 1,000,000 ($224). Much of it seems to have gone on the new houses, motorbikes and stocking market stalls and, following the spending spree, locals now say the compensation was insufficient.

In response, the company claims they do not appreciate that the 1,000,000 leones is not the only money they will receive, as Socfin is also paying an annual rent of $12.50 per hectare (2.47 acres). Sankoh said between 40 and 50 percent of that amount should go to local landowners.

It is in this atmosphere that protest took off in October, when local people blocked a road to the Socfin site.
A few weeks later in Kortumahun, where Socfin has leased much of the land previously used by villagers, Amara brandished a photo of arrested protesters taken by Shiaka Musa Sama, the local member of parliament.

Detractors say Sama, a member of the opposition Peoples' Movement for Democratic Change party, is trying to make hay the year before an election by inciting local trouble and feuding with his old enemy Paramount Chief Kebbie.

Sama says he is merely standing up for his constituents.

"It's not about my reelection, it's about the land," he told Reuters. "It's about thieving," he added in an assertion which is categorically denied by both Socfin and Kebbie's deputy.

The project is going ahead despite the protests, yet the episode has given some in Sierra Leone pause for thought.

Sankoh at the agriculture ministry concedes the agreed rent of $12.50 a hectare may have been too small, and signals that such projects are going to require careful handling by governments across Africa.

"It's possible that it was done too fast, too quick, and it did not give time to the landowners," he said. "The land ministry should have done more work."

Reuters

Guinea: tension between locals and palm oil, rubber company over land

Reports say tension is brewing between peasants from Saoro in the prefecture of Yomou in the forest region of Guinea and the Guinean Palm Oil and Rubber Company (Soguipah ), following the destruction of the farmers’ rice fields.

According to witnesses, Soguipah went into the area in early July with heavy machinery to open roads to the contested land, destroying villagers’ rice fields, coffee and rubber plantations. On July 28, police officials were dispatched by regional authorities to issue a notice of expropriation to the villagers. Clashes broke out and several farmers and community leaders were arrested.

“Since 1987, the state has been trying to rob us of our land to give it to Soguipah. And since we have no where to go we have been fighting this for three decades,” said Bangaly Conde, a spokesman for the villagers. “The government must realise that we will not give away our land, which we inherited from our ancestors.”

Fearing fresh violence, many fled the village and sought refuge in the church. Several were injured in the clashes, the witnesses said. More than 500 people including women, children and the elderly are said to have been displaced following the action by the company, which the locals see as land grabbing.

A correspondent says 115 of them have found refuge at the cathedral in Nzerékoré, the main city in that region of Guinea. Seven people reportedly beaten by security forces are in hospital in Nzérékoré receiving treatment for various injuries.

Lawyers Without Borders and the Equal Rights for All say they are disappointed with the government over the alleged attacks by gendarmes and army troops against the Saoro villagers.

The land conflict started in 2003 following a presidential decree allocating 2,000 hectares of land in Saoro village to the Company.

Guinea’s land law states that an expropriation decree must be implemented within the next three following years when a decree is made.

But according to Foromou Frederic Loua, president of Equal Rights for All in Guinea, this is not the case.

“This decree was made in 2003 and we are 2011… so as it is today, this decree is null and void. With the complicity of the local authorities, the population is being harshly treated.”

For the past two months, the application of this decree has set Guinea’s forestry authorities against the farmers of Saoro who, according to human rights defenders, have gone through violence in the hands of security agents.

According to the NGOs, several farmers have already fled to cities of Yomou and Nzérékoré or in the forest to escape the gendarmes and army troops, after their farms were destroyed by bulldozers.

AFP, West Africa Democracy Radio

Singapore group in $1.9 billion Cameroon palm oil deal

Biopalm Energy, a subsidiary of Singapore's Siva group will launch a 900 billion CFA Francs palm oil investment project in the south of Cameroon, an official of the country's agriculture ministry said on August 23.

The 200,000 hectares greenfield project will be jointly developed with the Central African nation's National Investment Corporation, the official said, requesting not to be named.

"The project will cost an estimated 900 billion CFA francs in foreign direct investments," the official said.

He said the mill would increase Cameroon's yearly palm oil production by 80,000 tonnes within the first five years of production, and would add about 30 billion CFA francs to crude-producing nation's yearly revenue.

Neither Siva Group nor Biopalm Energy could be reached for comments, however, Biopalm lists Cameroon and several other African countries including Ghana, Sierra Leone Ivory Coast and DR Congo as places it was in the process of acquiring greenfield land for palm oil production.

The company said on its website that the highly profitable world market for palm oil is projected to exceed 100 million tonnes by 2015.

Cameroon, which has seen its modest oil production decline to about 64,000 barrels per day from 185,000 bpd due to maturing fields, wants to explore other areas for foreign investments.

Its palm oil sector has attracted several industry majors. New York-based agricultural company Herakles Farms plans to develop some 60,000 hectares of oil palm plantations in the country, while Malaysia's Sime Darby is said to be considering a $2.5 billion plantation expansion deal.

Several environmental groups have however, raised concerns that the rapid expansion of agro-industries could not only threaten some of the Cameroon's unspoiled rainforest, but also the livelihood of the local population.

Australian environmental group Rainforest Rescue has launched an online petition aimed at pressuring the Cameroonian government to reconsider Herakles' planned project which they said could destroy plant and animal species, a charge the firm has rejected.

Reuters

Chinese entrepreneurs to invest in Benin palm oil production

by Serge-David Zoueme

A delegation of Chinese agricultural engineers and entrepreneurs decided to invest at least 1 billion CFA Francs ($2.15 million) in Benin’s palm oil industry after a visit to the western African nation.

Benin has vast untapped lands that could be used to produce palm oil and increase the output of agricultural products, the state-owned Office de Radiodiffusion et Television reported, citing Geng Wenbing, Chinese ambassador to the African country and chief of the delegation.

The Chinese will invest in the industry over the next five years to increase production and mechanize the industry. Palm oil is highly sought after in China for the manufacture of various food and cosmetic products.

“The funding plan and the amount will be announced by Chinese entrepreneurs toward the end of the year,” Benin’s Minister of Agriculture Sabai Kate was cited as saying by the Cotonou-based broadcaster.

Bloomberg

US company to invest in palm oil plantations in Cameroon, Ghana

Herakles Farms, a New York-based agriculture company, is planning two commercial-scale sustainable palm oil plantations in Cameroon and Ghana, providing over 10,000 jobs to local people.

Herakles Farms began working on the project in 2009, when it acquired 100 percent ownership in SG Sustainable Oils from Sithe Global. The plantations will follow the highest environmental and social standards, complying fully with Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO) Principles & Criteria. RSPO is a not-for-profit association that unites stakeholders from the palm oil industry to develop and implement global standards for sustainable palm oil.

"We are very excited.... the need for local supply is significant. In 2009, Africa imported approximately 4 million tons of palm oil, primarily from Indonesia and Malaysia. Currently, the continent's average per capita consumption of oils and fats is only about 11 kg, compared to the world average of about 24 kg," said Bruce Wrobel, CEO of Herakles Farms. "In addition to reducing dependence on imports for this food staple, the plantations will deliver a whole range of benefits for the local population, including jobs, housing, health clinics, clean water and schools, while safeguarding the incredible biodiversity of this part of the world."

Herakles Farms

The World Bank’s mistake in suspending support for palm plantations

by Thompson Ayodele*


When the World Bank held its annual meeting recently, there was much discussion of trade imbalances and currency wars, but nothing about Nigerian palm oil. That’s a shame, because the bank’s loans for plantation agriculture in sub-Saharan Africa and other developing regions — some $132 million of which have gone to palm oil cultivation — have been humanitarian and economic triumphs. Yet now, under misguided pressure from environmental groups, the bank is turning its back on the program.

Palm oil, which is extracted from the pulp of the oil palm, is an essential food in sub-Saharan Africa and other poor regions. Accounting for almost 40 percent of the world’s vegetable oils, it is an indispensable source of vitamins and calories. The developing world is heavily reliant on palm as a source of nutrition because the plant thrives in tropical climates and yields significantly more fats and calories than other options. It gives the developing world — where hundreds of millions of men and women still live on a few dollars a day — the most caloric bang for the buck.

Nigeria’s palm oil industry, which once led the world, was moribund by the end of the last century. But thanks to the World Bank program, it is now one of the world’s largest producers, after Indonesia and Malaysia. In addition to providing food, the palm oil sector offers jobs, employing tens of thousands of Nigerians who earn wages similar to those of college graduates. In a country where most people have limited education, this sector has been essential to helping the broader Nigerian economy grow.

The industry is also diverse, as both small-scale landholders and a growing number of industrial farms have used the World Bank loans to invest in more efficient harvesting and production techniques. The revival of the palm oil industry gives Nigeria hope that its economy will not be forever hostage to petroleum production — and the pollution and graft that inevitably accompany it.

But the bank’s legacy of success is now in serious jeopardy. Under the leadership of Robert Zoellick, a former United States trade representative, the bank has wavered from its poverty-reduction mission and is increasingly focusing on achieving fashionable political and social goals. As Mr. Zoellick put it, “We are all committed to ensuring that positive developmental outcomes — including environmental and social sustainability — are at the core of all our activities.”

This is a huge, and disturbing, change in direction. The World Bank was conceived out of the wreckage of World War II, and its mission has always been simple: extend low-interest loans from rich nations to support development projects in poor nations. Of necessity, many of these loans support agriculture-related projects. These projects do two crucial things. First, they help poor nations feed their populations. Second, they generate goods that can be traded in global markets, thus linking the developing world economically with the wealthy world.

The results have been extraordinary. According to the bank itself, since its inception, life expectancy in developing countries has risen by more than 20 years. Adult illiteracy in poor nations has been cut in half since 1980. And over the past two decades, the number of people living on less than $1 a day, while unacceptably high, has dropped for the first time.

But in many cases this progress has now run afoul of environmental groups that often put ideology ahead of the needs of the poor. And, unfortunately, these groups have persuaded Mr. Zoellick to suspend all loans for palm-related plantation agriculture indefinitely as the bank undertakes a review of its policies.

The critics of palm oil production, mostly in the United States and Europe, claim that it contributes to the destruction of forests. Yes, Nigeria has a problem with deforestation — but that is primarily in the country’s north, and almost all palm oil plantations are in the south. The forest depletion in the north is generally due to climate problems and the population’s reliance on firewood for fuel.

Indeed, the expected drop in palm oil production because of the World Bank’s decision is likely to worsen deforestation, as a weakened economy will force more Nigerians to chop down trees for cooking fuel and shelter.

The environmental effects of palm oil production around the world should certainly be given consideration, but any new regulations should not impede poverty alleviation in the developing world, as poverty is the biggest driver of ecological harm. And there are many multilateral organizations that focus on environmental health, including several within the United Nations, that are far better equipped than the World Bank to handle the job.

Mission creep is a threat to any large bureaucracy. What has made the World Bank almost uniquely successful over the last half-century has been its sustained focus on the most important humanitarian goal: lessening poverty. The moment the bank takes its eye off economic growth, it loses its reason for being. The residents of the developing world will be the casualties.

*Thompson Ayodele is the director of the Initiative for Public Policy Analysis, an independent public policy group.

New York Times

Disease lays waste to Colombia's oil palms

by Chris Kraul

Standing amid hundreds of African oil palms, their gray and desiccated fronds drooping to the ground, Edgar Barrera shakes his head and speaks of their death sentence.

"What we have is a technological disaster, an economic disaster and a social disaster," said Barrera, superintendent of the Bucarelia company's 12,000-acre African palm grove.

Barrera is referring to a mysterious, fast-spreading and deadly disease called "PC" that has devastated African palm plantations here in the Magdalena River valley area 200 miles north of Bogota, the capital, and elsewhere in Colombia. More than 60% of Bucarelia's palm trees are dead or dying because of it, he said.

Instances of mysterious crop maladies attacking entire regions are nothing new in the hemisphere. But the ravages of PC go beyond agriculture; the damage extends to Colombia's drug fighting and energy policies.

By decimating palm groves, the disease is eliminating an alternative crop to coca, cocaine's raw material, which is illegally grown in abundance hereabout. And unless a cure is found, PC could also impede Colombia's ambitious shift to biofuels, including palm oil.

"That little bug is eating our future," said Barrera, an agronomist who said he feels impotent before a sickness that destroyed more than half a million of his company's trees. "Everyone has a hypothesis why he is unstoppable, but at the end of the day, no one knows."

"PC" stands for the Spanish words for "bud rot," and the disease kills any palm tree that becomes infected. First a microorganism called phythophthora attacks the soft growth matrix of the palm. The odor attracts insects called palm weevils, which bore into the tree, killing it.

Historically, when the focus of palm cultivation was cooking oil and cosmetics, Colombia always had manageable amounts of PC, said National University of Colombia researcher Edgar Benitez. But all that changed this decade when palm oil became desirable as a clean-burning substitute for diesel, and acreage doubled.

For reasons not fully understood, the PC microorganism has mutated into strains that spread much faster and can't be controlled, Benitez said. Over-fertilization and inadequate drainage are just two of the theories being advanced. But the bottom line, he said, is that African palm grown on such a massive scale is a relatively "new crop" and the knowledge base is small.

President Alvaro Uribe has tirelessly promoted the crop, making it a special cause. His government has begun to phase in mandated quotas that by 2015 will require that 20% of all fuel burned by trucks and buses be made with biofuels.

The government's promotion of African palm has generated enormous controversy here, as has been the case in other countries where similar campaigns are underway. Critics contend that a crop occupying hundreds of thousands of acres encourages land grabs and forces the displacement of impoverished farmers.

On a tour of his grove, which stretches as far as the eye can see, Barrera pointed out telltale signs of initial infestation: new stalks of palm fronds emerging gray from the trunk instead of a healthy lime green color.

"The owners of neighboring plantations have resorted to witchcraft. They've hired magic potion salesmen who also claim to have cures for AIDS and cancer. They've held Masses to bless one tree at a time," Barrera said. "Nothing works."

Fedepalma, the association of Colombian palm farmers, has mounted a disease-management program centering on hybrids. But chief researcher Gerardo Martinez acknowledged in a recent interview that there was no known cure.

It's not just huge plantations such as Bucarelia that are suffering. Miguel Angel Marquez, 60, who plowed his life's savings into a 35-acre grove that was once highly profitable, is still coming to grips with the disaster.

Since he first noted signs of PC in 2007, the plague has slowly taken over his 2,000 palm trees, killing 1,200 of them. The surviving palms' days are numbered, he said.

"We've been told to plant hybrids, but I just don't have the same enthusiasm as before," Marquez said. "When I finally was forced to tell my wife that this disease is for real, we just sat down and cried."

Los Angeles Times

Oil palm genome research to help increase yields

by Emma Ritch

A consortium including the Malaysian Palm Oil Board (MPOB) and St. Louis, Mo.-based Orion Genomics announced they sequenced and assembled three oil palm genomes in an ongoing project to find ways to increase yield, protect against disease, and strengthen plants against environmental stress.

The three oil palm genomes came from two oil palm species: E. oleifera, which is native to South America, and E. guineensis, which originates in Africa.

E. guineensis is more widely planted in Malaysia because of its high productivity, but E. oleifera offers increased resistance to disease and oil with higher quantities of unsaturated fats.

The group says its work provides a comprehensive genetic blueprint that could blend the benefits of the two species of the plant, increasing yields and productivity for the growing food and biodiesel markets.

The potential benefits of genome sequencing also prompted La Jolla, Calif.-based Synthetic Genomics to partner with Malaysia's Asiatic Centre for Genome Technology on research of oil palm genomes for biofuel feedstocks.

The consortium announcing the findings said their work is unique because it provides comprehensive genetic and transcriptional maps that could help oil palm researchers as they seek to understand the genes responsible for yield, disease resistance and resistance to environmental stress.

The group also included St. Louis-based MOgene, The Genome Center at Washington University, South Korea-based Macrogen, and Adelaide, Australia-based GeneWorks.

MPOB, Orion and MOgene also announced plans to study the epigenetic makeup of oil palm in 2010 in an effort to improve yields.

Last week, researchers from Duke University, Stanford University and Brazil unveiled two studies that examined the genome structures of biofuel yeasts in order to increasing ethanol production.

Cleantech

Agriterra plans to buy Liberian palm oil firm

by Ramkumar

Agricultural sector-focussed Agriterra Ltd said in August it planned to buy West African palm oil company Equatorial Biofuels (Guernsey) Ltd from Equatorial Palm Oil Plc for about $12 million in cash and stock.

The company, which is focussed in central and southern Africa, said Equatorial Biofuels, located in Liberia, would complement its existing grain processing and cattle ranching in Mozambique.

Agriterra, a former oil and gas explorer under the name White Nile Ltd, said it would pay $2.5 million in cash and issue 110 million shares and that it had signed a memorandum of understanding.

"By diversifying our product range to include food stuffs such as crude palm oil, which is used in a plethora of products such as margarine, chocolate and zero-trans fat cooking oil, we enable year round processing of a variety of products," the company said in a statement.

There is potential for early cash flow from EBF from the reactivation of up to 10,000 hectares of existing plantations. EBF has also established strong relationships with local and regional government, with a 50-year investment agreement signed and ratified by the Liberian government, Agriterra said

Reuters

Malaysian conglomerate to develop oil palm, rubber estates in Liberia

by Niluksi Koswanage

Malaysia's biggest company Sime Darby has struck a deal with the Liberian government to develop oil palm and rubber estates in West African nation as land runs out at home and global demand for palm oil surges.

Sime, a conglomerate that owns businesses from plantations to property, said on Monday it would invest an initial $20 million for 10,000 hectares of oil palm estates but an industry source said the investment for the 63-year concession would eventually be $800 million.

"It is increasingly difficult to acquire arable plantation land in Asia and thus it is imperative that new frontiers be sought to meet increasing demand," said Sime Chief Executive Ahmad Zubir Murshid in a statement. "Sime Darby will also have the first mover advantage over future entrants into Liberia in terms of securing choice land."

Sime Darby's Liberian venture is the latest in a series of deals struck by foreign firms and nations with African nations to secure food supplies. The firm will develop 220,000 hectares of land, compared to 100,000 hectares now available for plantations in Malaysia, due to land use restrictions here.

Sime's rival, Singaporean oil palm giant Wilmar International, struck a deal in Africa last year, while Italian firm Fri-el Green is signing a pact with Congo to develop 40,000 hectares of oil palm for biofuels.

Analysts say Sime's investment, expected to speed up agricultural growth in Liberia after years of a civil war that ended in 2003, may be risky.

Oil palm grows naturally in Africa and was imported during British rule to Malaysia, now the world's second largest producer after neighbouring Indonesia.

"We normally view expansion is palm oil positively, but palm oil expension in Liberia is untested," Alain Lai, an analyst with UBS, said in a research note. "Sime Darby's management could have already done its studies, but we believe the quality of labour, infrastructure, and stability of government policies would generally be the key issues," he said.

Interest in expanding palm states, rehabilitating rubber plantations and securing grain supplies has been driving some of the acquisitions in Africa where just 14 percent of the 184 million hectares of arable land are cultivated, according to Food and Agriculture Organisation data.

Such ventures can be potentially risky in Africa where land ownership is an emotive issue.

South Korean firm Daewoo Logistics's plans in Madagascar to lease a million hectares to grow corn and oil palms played a big part in the removal of President Marc Ravalomanana in March and led his successor to end the deal.

Reuters

Genetic secrets of date palm unlocked

By mapping a draft version of the date palm genome, scientists at Weill Cornell Medical College in Qatar (WCMC-Q) have unraveled the genetic secrets stored in the fruit. Date palm trees play a significant role in agriculture throughout the Middle East, Northern Africa and Pakistan and the fruit is a major source of nutrition in those areas.

Joel Malek, director of the Genomics Laboratory at Weill Cornell Medical College in Qatar, said that the date palm sequencing work was a proof-of-concept study. “We have generated a draft DNA sequence and initial assembly of the date palm using the most advanced technology,” said Malek.

Genetic information about the date palm is extremely valuable to researchers who are working to improve fruit yield and quality and to better understand susceptibility and resistance to disease.

To produce the draft map, researchers used a next-generation sequencing approach, which, according to Malek, offers data quality between that of the expressed sequence tag (EST) method and the traditional whole-genome mapping method. “We were able to develop a relatively unbiased view of the gene space of the entire date palm plant at a fraction of the cost and in a much shorter period of time. Using this approach, which takes advantage of the lower repetitive DNA in the date palm gene regions, we have increased the publicly available knowledge of the date palm gene by about 1,000 fold,’ said Malek.

The researchers obtained the DNA from leaves of the date palm provided by the Qatar Plant Tissue Culture Lab in the Department of Agriculture and Water Research (Qatar Ministry of Municipal Affairs and Agriculture). Malek said that his team would continue to improve the draft sequence and publish their data.

The Roar

South Korean company plans maize project in Madagascar

A South Korean company hopes to turn an undeveloped stretch of Madagascar into a corn-production center, an official said on November 19.

Daewoo Logistics Corp. envisions growing corn on 2.5 million acres of land, mostly in the Indian Ocean island's arid west, said Shin Dong-hyun, the Daewoo official in charge of the project.

Besides corn, the company also wants to plant palm oil on 741,000 acres in rainy eastern Madagascar, Shin said. He said Daewoo has secured a 99-year lease and is working out final details on rental fees and taxes with officials in Madagascar. "We hope we (can) launch the project as soon as possible," Shin said.

South Korean business groups have expressed interest in investing once the deal is finalized, he said. He said it will likely cost $6 billion over the first 25 years.

Ultimately, the project is targeting production of 5.5 million tons of corn a year, though that could take 15 years to achieve, Shin said. South Korea currently imports about 11 million tons of corn a year, he said, mostly from the United States.

Shin said the sparsely populated area on Madagascar's west coast targeted for corn production lacks roads and irrigation facilities, which will need to be built. About 2,000 hectares may be planted initially, he said. There is "almost no infrastructure there now," he said.

He said the company has yet to finalize a sales plan for the corn it produces, though added it could end up being used as corn starch or animal feed in South Korea or exported to the Middle East, India and China.

Daewoo plans to bring in agricultural experts from South America and South Africa to work on the project. Laborers will mostly come from Madagascar, with a few from South Africa, he said. The project could end up creating more than 70,000 jobs on the island.

"We'd like to contribute to Madagascar's economic development," he said.

Forbes

UN project to boost palm oil production in Cameroon, Nigeria

by Divine Nytaryike

Oil palms are grown throughout West and Central Africa, but the development of the palm oil industry has been slow, despite a thriving market. Palm oil is a common ingredient in traditional dishes in West and Central Africa. It is cheaper than vegetable oil and can also be used to make soap and pomade.

There are several reasons for the low output: obsolete production equipment, aging plantations and little access to technology and financing. Cameroon produces 160,000 tons of palm oil a year. That's far below demand, which is expected to reach 220,000 tons by 2010. This year, Cameroon imported 50,000 tons of palm oil. In some parts of the country, small scale farmers must crush palm fruits in unhygienic stone pits, from which the reddish oil is filtered. The quality is often not the best and the risk of contamination high.

The United Nations Organization for Industrial Development [UNIDO] is overseeing a project to boost sustainable palm oil production in Cameroon and neighboring Nigeria. The two countries will provide the financial support for the five million dollar project, which will span four years.

The coordinator is Chief Michael Mbi Oruh, the technical adviser in Cameroon's Ministry of Industries, Mines and Technological Development. He says the goal is to help the countries use palm oil to generate income. He told the Nigerian Press Agency that Cameroon will contribute $500,000 and Nigeria will give $800,000 to kick off the project.

The money will be used to train farmers in new and more efficient ways of processing palm oil. It will also buy planting material and equipment. UNIDO will provide expertise in training and in buying the equipment and high quality plants for the old plantations.

A commission is now laying the groundwork for the start of the project in southwest Nigeria. The project will try to help small scale farmers to gain control of 85 percent of the palm oil market in West and Central Africa. The farmers are enthusiastic. They have been told that plantations, some more than 25 years old, will be re-planted with better quality seeds.

Experts say the project is a huge boost for the palm oil sector in the region. Cameroon and Nigeria have the right tropical climate and rich soils. Yields will eventually increase, the quality of the product will improve and production costs will drop, leading to more income for producers.

It is estimated the project will create a thousand new jobs, and maybe even more – once investors beginning marketing by-products from the palm oil.

VOA

African Development Bank funds rubber, oil palm projects in Gabon

The African Development Bank (AfDB) Group has signed an agreement for a loan of € 10 million under its private sector window with the Tropical Agriculture Investment Company (SIAT) of Gabon to finance an agriculture expansion project in the country.

The agreement was signed on February 19 in Tunisia, where the bank has its headquarteres.

Speaking after the signing ceremony, Mr. Gantsho of the AfDB noted that the rubber and oil palm plantations expansion project will create some 520 permanent employment with women constituting about 35% of the permanent workforce and about 40% of the seasonal workers, thereby making a positive impact on the population of Woleu-Ntem and Moyen-Ogooue provinces of the country.

“The development of a dynamic private sector in the Regional Member Countries ranks high among the Bank Group’s priorities to support sustainable development and reduce poverty in Africa. We give special attention to projects that are designed to provide high development impact,” he emphasized.

Noting that the agricultural expansion is one of such projects that have proved to be effective midway between large private firms and micro and small enterprises, because of its outgrower rubber scheme which will support 500 farmers and provide them with training to enhance their skills and improve their productivity.

Mr. Gantsho noted that collaboration with the SIAT Group began in December 2002 with an approval of a € 7.14 million loan to Ghana Oil Company, adding that the signing of Tuesday’s agreement marked the consolidation of the collaboration between SIAT and the Bank Group.

“We have been impressed by the good governance demonstrated by the SIAT Group in the Ghana project. We look forward to this new project and hoping that SIAT Gabon will become an example of best practices for corporate governance, transparency and accountability, which could be replicated in future Bank interventions of similar nature,” Mr. Gantsho said.

Speaking on the occasion, SIAT-Gabon Chairman, Pierre Vandebeeck, explained that the company, which has invested heavily in Ghana, Nigeria, Cameroon and Cote d’Ivoire, started operations in Gabon four years ago following the acquisition of 7,000 hectares of state plantations which now provide jobs for 3,600 people. The company has moved on level up with a programme to invest 40% equity shares in the local stock exchange in Gabon as one way of empowering the workers.

SIAT-Ghana is the company’s biggest investments with 20,000 hectares under cultivation and employing 6,500 farmers, among other huge investments. The company is doing big agro-business in Nigeria where it is listed on the Nigeria. It moved into Cote d’Ivoire in 2007.

“I believe we have established a track record with the African Development Bank and we hope to continue doing business with you, “ he said.

The AfDB Executive Director for Cote d’Ivoire, Frederic Korsaga, for his part, said the boards and management of the Bank Group were placing more emphasis on private sector ventures like SIAT for rapid and sustainable growth capable of helping poverty reduction and job creation efforts in African countries.

He noted that given the continent’s rising population, which is projected to reach 2.5 billion in 2030, two major challenges that the continent would face would be food self sufficiency and job-creation.The private sector must be fully involved as such huge tasks cannot be left with governments alone, he added.

Africa News

Europe reconsiders biofuels target

Europe's environment chief has admitted that the EU did not foresee the problems raised by its policy to get 10% of Europe's road fuels from plants. EU Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas said it would be better to miss the target than achieve it by harming the poor or damaging the environment.

Recent reports have warned of rising food prices and rainforest destruction from increased biofuel production. The EU has promised new guidelines to ensure that its target is not damaging.

A couple of years ago biofuels looked like the perfect get-out-of-jail free card for car manufacturers under pressure to cut carbon emissions. Instead of just revolutionising car design they could reduce transport pollution overall if drivers used more fuel from plants which would have soaked up CO2 while they were growing.

The EU leapt at the idea - and set their biofuels targets. Since then reports have warned that some biofuels barely cut emissions at all - and others can lead to rainforest destruction, drive up food prices, or prompt rich firms to drive poor people off their land to convert it to fuel crops.

"We have seen that the environmental problems caused by biofuels and also the social problems are bigger than we thought they were. So we have to move very carefully," Dimas said. "We have to have criteria for sustainability, including social and environmental issues, because there are some benefits from biofuels."

He said the EU would introduce a certification scheme for biofuels and promised a clampdown on biodiesel from palm oil which is leading to forest destruction in Indonesia.

Some analysts doubt that "sustainable" palm oil exists because any palm oil used for fuel simply swells the demand for the product oil on the global market which is mainly governed by food firms.

BBC

Brazil to assist Congo with biofuel projects

Brazil has signed two agreements with Congo Republic to provide the poor central African state with training, technology and financing to produce biofuel from sugar cane and palm oil.

Congolese President Denis Sassou-Nguesso said at a news conference with Brazil's Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva that his country's oil production would dwindle within years and it was necessary to look to the future.

Lula said Africa had plenty of land to produce biofuel and could provide a solution to the energy deficit of the world's poorest continent. "We are ready to accompany the continent and we are willing to help those countries which want to follow Brazil's example: today we are self-sufficient in energy," Lula said.

Brazil's state oil company, Petrobras, expects ethanol sales in Latin America's largest country to beat gasoline consumption by around 2020.

Africa produces a range of crops that could be used to make biofuel, including sugar cane, sugar beet, maize, sorghum and cassava -- all of which can be used to make ethanol -- and peanuts, whose oil can be used to power diesel engines.

Engineering News