76
4 International Bioeconomy Governance …
producer countries where GBEP members have deployed biofuels under this partnership’s auspices. Still, overseas promotion is something that large players—the US,
Brazil, and the EU—already were doing, according to their views, and regardless of
those international institutions.
4.3 Equity: Access and Allocation Patterns
More often than not, debates on biofuel or bioeconomy sustainability overlook equity
issues. Impacts on people’s access to land, water, and food have been vital concerns,
but the treatment of these issues in international biofuel policy remains limited and
ad hoc. Extensive lip service may be paid to access issues by discussing voluntary
sustainability parameters in multiple fora. Still, in reality, these problems have been
left essentially for the market or individual countries to resolve—however limited
their capacity may be. At the international level, access issues have received only
nominal attention, without any collective policy measures. Despite some consensus
around the Sustainable Development Goals, the tone of international biofuel (or
bioeconomy) governance on equity remains the same one set at the 2008 High-Level
Conference on World Food Security: biofuel impacts on food and ecosystems are
discussed, and challenges are acknowledged, yet no international policies or concrete
actions are agreed upon (High-Level Conference on World Food Security 2008).
However, leaving access issues to be addressed only by individual countries may
prove dangerous because it does not account for the extraterritorial effects of domestic
biofuel policies (Bastos Lima and Gupta 2014). There is little that food-insecure
countries can do if the bioeconomy policies of major agricultural producers affect
international food prices (see Clapp 2009). If anything, the COVID-19 pandemic has
revealed the significant risks that agricultural commodity market volatility poses to
developing countries (Clapp and Moseley 2021). The same applies to other global
changes that may be triggered by expanding bio-based production, such as impacts
on the climate, global hydrology, or cumulative effects of land-use change (see
Rockström et al. 2009).
In addition, the surge of large-scale land investments (notably in Africa), driven
in part by biofuels, has disenfranchised many indigenous peoples and the rural poor,
exploiting the insecure land tenure situation of most of those customary owners
(Borras and Franco 2012; Cotula et al. 2011). This phenomenon can be understood as
state and non-state actors with the financial capital, but without the arable land needed
(at least not at the same costs) for growing food and biofuel feedstock, increasing
their access to natural resources while reducing that of local populations (Cotula et al.
2008). This access transfer typically includes not only land but also freshwater, associated with the land and embodied in the agricultural products exported (Takahashi
and Ortega 2010). Such dispossession is not a new phenomenon; it has been widely
observed in other sectors, such as in tree plantations for the shipping industry during
the colonial era or for the pulp and paper industry in post-colonial times. However,
4 International Bioeconomy Governance …
producer countries where GBEP members have deployed biofuels under this partnership’s auspices. Still, overseas promotion is something that large players—the US,
Brazil, and the EU—already were doing, according to their views, and regardless of
those international institutions.
4.3 Equity: Access and Allocation Patterns
More often than not, debates on biofuel or bioeconomy sustainability overlook equity
issues. Impacts on people’s access to land, water, and food have been vital concerns,
but the treatment of these issues in international biofuel policy remains limited and
ad hoc. Extensive lip service may be paid to access issues by discussing voluntary
sustainability parameters in multiple fora. Still, in reality, these problems have been
left essentially for the market or individual countries to resolve—however limited
their capacity may be. At the international level, access issues have received only
nominal attention, without any collective policy measures. Despite some consensus
around the Sustainable Development Goals, the tone of international biofuel (or
bioeconomy) governance on equity remains the same one set at the 2008 High-Level
Conference on World Food Security: biofuel impacts on food and ecosystems are
discussed, and challenges are acknowledged, yet no international policies or concrete
actions are agreed upon (High-Level Conference on World Food Security 2008).
However, leaving access issues to be addressed only by individual countries may
prove dangerous because it does not account for the extraterritorial effects of domestic
biofuel policies (Bastos Lima and Gupta 2014). There is little that food-insecure
countries can do if the bioeconomy policies of major agricultural producers affect
international food prices (see Clapp 2009). If anything, the COVID-19 pandemic has
revealed the significant risks that agricultural commodity market volatility poses to
developing countries (Clapp and Moseley 2021). The same applies to other global
changes that may be triggered by expanding bio-based production, such as impacts
on the climate, global hydrology, or cumulative effects of land-use change (see
Rockström et al. 2009).
In addition, the surge of large-scale land investments (notably in Africa), driven
in part by biofuels, has disenfranchised many indigenous peoples and the rural poor,
exploiting the insecure land tenure situation of most of those customary owners
(Borras and Franco 2012; Cotula et al. 2011). This phenomenon can be understood as
state and non-state actors with the financial capital, but without the arable land needed
(at least not at the same costs) for growing food and biofuel feedstock, increasing
their access to natural resources while reducing that of local populations (Cotula et al.
2008). This access transfer typically includes not only land but also freshwater, associated with the land and embodied in the agricultural products exported (Takahashi
and Ortega 2010). Such dispossession is not a new phenomenon; it has been widely
observed in other sectors, such as in tree plantations for the shipping industry during
the colonial era or for the pulp and paper industry in post-colonial times. However,