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CARACAS—Venezuelan
President Hugo Chavez criticized on Sunday the use of
agricultural products to produce biofuels, saying the
United States’
policy of supporting the practice could lead to
“disaster.”
In his
weekly broadcast Hello President, Chavez repudiated US
President George W. Bush’s policies of respecting the
use of crops to produce biofuels.
“Now
Bush says trees and bush will produce ethanol. I can
imagine people going crazy to cut trees and leaving
everything like a desert,” said Chavez.
He set
Mexico and Central America, where corn production
prevails, as examples of the consequences of using food
to produce biofuels.
Nicaraguan “President Daniel Ortega tells me that many
Nicaraguan corn producers have compromised their
production for the next five years by taking it to the
United States. That will be a disaster!” Chavez said.
He said
that ethanol production is not intended to create
electricity for homes or medical centers, but to ensure
that “illogical, absurd and stupid capitalism can
continue its voracious growth.”
Meanwhile, in London, it was reported that the National
Express Group Plc. suspended a biodiesel trial at its UK
bus operations after consulting environmental groups,
the Guardian reported, citing chief executive officer
Richard Bowker.
The
group said there was “considerable concern’’ that
biofuel production from crops such as sugar cane or
rapeseed, would destroy natural habitats and increase
the cost of farming in developing countries, the
Guardian said.
The
company will continue to look at similar initiatives,
but its biofuel study determined that “what appears to
be green option may not actually be green after all,’’
the newspaper cited Bowker as saying. (Bloomberg) |
