Nice article here.
Is the yellow flower set to become our new black gold?
DAN BUGLASS RURAL AFFAIRS EDITOR
OILSEED rape, once dubbed the yellow peril of the countryside and
judged responsible for a range of respiratory problems in the human
population, is set to be the crop of tomorrow - provided farmers are
given suitable incentives - as the price of a barrel of crude oil
remains stubbornly close to $80.
For the past ten years farmers throughout the European Union have
been obliged to have a minimum of 10 per cent of their arable land in
set aside. That meant in blunt terms that they were paid for growing
nothing. The rationale behind this regime was that Europe and the rest
of the world was awash with surplus grain and oilseeds for which there
was no market.
That
has now all changed with world stocks of grain, soya and oilseeds at
their lowest for more than 30 years. Arable farmers have enjoyed their
most profitable harvest for at least a decade. Set-aside has now been
consigned to history, with oilseed rape prices having virtually doubled
to almost £246 per tonne in Scotland. The same holds true for wheat,
with prices now close to £200 per tonne.
The real driver is the fear in the US of being left short of oil
from the Middle East: huge quantities of grain and soya are being
diverted to the production of ethanol for fuel, with new plants being
brought on stream almost on a monthly basis.
A similar trend has been evident in Germany and, to a lesser extent,
in France. In Germany there are now 3,500 plants of varying sizes, many
of them on farms, producing biofuels - and that number is forecast to
grow by at least 500 during the next year.
In the UK as a whole only 3 per cent of electricity is produced by
renewable sources, but the figure is somewhat higher in Scotland, with
its growing number of wind farms.
The UK government is falling far behind the rest of the EU in
encouraging the cultivation of arable crops for energy. John Picken,
the chair of NFU Scotland's combinable crops committee, said: "The
current rebates on biofuels at around 20p per litre is not enough to
make the business economic, especially with a huge international demand
for all crops for human consumption. The UK government will have to
realise that the rebate will have to be closer to 40p per litre to make
it worthwhile for both farmers and processors."
The EU policy on renewable energy crops is still confused in that if
the total area exceeds two million hectares, Brussels will cap the
level of support payable to farmers.
David Richardson, a highly respected industry commentator of
long-standing who farms in Norfolk, in his regular column for Farmers
Weekly caught the current mood when he wrote: "If the government is
serious about renewable energy it must give it full encouragement and
make it attractive. Current measures are half-hearted and ineffective."
