Brazil’s UNICA welcomes parts of European Parliament biofuel vote, cautions about threat to WTO compliance

In Brazil, UNICA, the Brazilian Sugarcane Industry Association issues a statement on the European Parliament Environment Committee’s vote Thursday on biofuels and the issue of indirect land use change, or ILUC, which reads in part:

“UNICA welcomes European Union policymakers’ diligence and efforts in pushing for the consumption of biofuels that have the highest environmental credentials and technical performance,” said UNICA CEO, Elizabeth Farina. “UNICA is encouraged that the Environment Committee voted Thursday to approve measures that would help incentivize the production of more advanced biofuels,” she added.

“However, UNICA is disappointed that the Environment Committee voted today to put an arbitrary cap on the use of all food-based biofuels,” said Géraldine Kutas, Head of International Affairs at UNICA.

“Such a cap ignores important differences between conventional biofuels’ environmental performance and is vulnerable to being de facto discriminatory and breaching World Trade Organization rules,” she said.