The Biofuels Association of Australia today fired back at claims made by the Australian Lot Feeder's Association that biofuels are diverting crops away from food sources or pushing up food prices in Australia.

"These sorts of comments by the Lot Feeder's are really not helpful to anyone" said Heather Brodie, CEO of the BAA. "Not only are they misleading to the public but are quite simply wrong. Using the feedlot industry's own analysis from the Centre for International Economics (August 2005) the possible price impact of a 700 million litre grain based ethanol industry in Australia would be at most only be 2%" Ms Brodie said.

"The Lot Feeder's recognise that the only evidence for price rises comes from overseas. Well the UK Government just two weeks ago released a report that unequivocally concluded that biofuels were not to blame for rising food prices". The full report can be found at www.defra.gov.uk/foodfarm/food/pdf/ag-price-annex%205.pdf (PDF will open in new window).

"As rightly pointed out by AgForce, it must be kept in mind that the input costs of fuel and fertiliser accounts for over half of the operating costs of crop farms. The danger in the type of comments made by the Lot Feeder's is that of looking for an easy answer, not necessarily the right answer, and one that only focuses on a single industry (that of grain fed cattle) instead of the bigger picture".

"Australia's production of biofuels predominantly comes from waste streams such waste starch, molasses, or non-human food sources. We need to recognise that locally produced, environmentally sustainable and economically viable transport fuels will be necessary in order to meet fuel demands in the future" Ms Brodie said.

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