Bioenergy in Africa Workshop to be held in South Africa and Mozambique

Researchers will meet to discuss the viability of sustainable energy production in Latin America, the Caribbean and Africa.

Agência FAPESP – Latin America and Africa will begin an analysis of their bioenergy production potential on the occasion of the Bioenergy in Africa Workshop to be held April 1-5, 2014 in South Africa and Mozambique where researchers will gather for the purpose of determining the viability of implementing intensive sustainable bioenergy programs on the two continents by 2050.

The gathering launches the second phase of the Global Sustainable Bioenergy (GSB) program – a global initiative funded by the São Paulo Research Foundation (FAPESP), Oak Ridge National Lab (ORNL) and Bio-Based, Ecologically Balanced Sustainable Industrial Chemistry (BE-Basic), and involving research networks in various countries.   

The Bioenergy in Africa Workshop is a contribution of the FAPESP Thematic Project  “Bioenergy Contribution of Latin America, the Caribbean and Africa to the GSB,” coordinated by Luís Augusto Barbosa Cortez of the University of Campinas (Unicamp) to the Latin America, Caribbean & Africa (LACAf) program of the GSB. 

“The LACAf proposal is to study Latin America and Africa, two continents that have the most potential for producing biofuels, and for which Brazil has an affinity,” explains Cortez who is executive vice-president of international relations at Unicamp, researcher in the Interdisciplinary Center for Energy Planning (NIPE) at that same university, deputy coordinator of FAPESP, and member of the executive board of the GSB. 

The GSB seeks to expand and disseminate knowledge and technologies related to the production of bioenergy according to parameters of sustainability.   

In 2013, during the program’s first phase, conventions were held on the five continents to define actions plans for a second phase when detailed strategies will be established to provide for the future energy demands of companies, without compromising food production, the environment or biodiversity.  

The first part of the Bioenergy in Africa Workshop will provide an overview of the LACAf and GSB Projects.  With participants from Brazil, the US, the Netherlands and  The New Partnership for Africa's Development (NEPAD, an institution dedicated to  socioeconomic development of Africa), topics will include such things as “Why produce bioenergy in Africa?”,  “Sustainable energy for all,” “The replicability of the Brazilian bioenergy model in Africa,” and “Determining biomass potential in South Africa and Mozambique.”

To Cortez, the LACAf contribution to the GSB is strategic, since the two are the only continents in the world that still have land available for food and biofuel production.  “The world has nearly 440 million hectares of land for agricultural use, 60% of which is in Latin America – 150 million hectares in Brazil alone – and 40% of which is in Africa.  Other regions have very little room to increase their agricultural frontier. What remains are deserts and mountains.”

Open only to researchers, the Bioenergy in Africa Workshop will be held April 1-2 in the auditorium of the Kruger National Park, one of South Africa’s main national parks, located in that country’s northeast, on the border of Mozambique, a country that will also hold workshop meetings on the topic April 4-5, at the auditorium of the Hotel Cardoso, in Maputo.

Event: Bioenergy in Africa Workshop
When: April 1, 2, 4 and 5, 2014
Schedule: 8:30 am – 5:15 pm 
Where: Kruger National Park Auditorium (South Africa) and the Hotel Cardoso (Mozambique)

Additional information at: 
The GSB Project http://208.67.2.44/gsb/index.html
The BIOEN Program: http://bioenfapesp.org/