Government is pushing for biofuel production to reduce crude import bill. Can it steer clear of the food versus fuel dilemma?
ON WORLD Biofuel Day, Prime Minister Narendra Modi fuelled a hope. “India can save 12,000 crore in foreign exchange in the next four years due to ethanol blending in petrol,” he said at a time when the country’s crude import bill has touched 8 lakh crore. Union Road Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari has also been harping on the importance of alternative fuels. During a recent visit to Charoda in Chhattisgarh’s Durg district, he said the state has immense potential for biofuel, referring to India’s first biofuel-powered flight from Dehradun to Delhi on August 27 that used oil from jatropha (Jatropha curcas) seeds in Chhattisgarh.
While Gadkari has been lobbying for biofuel ever since he assumed office in 2014, his advocacy is seen with suspicion, given his long association with the sugar and ethanol industry. His latest hypothesis that Chhattisgarh could emerge as a biofuel hub echoes Chief Minister Raman Singh’s 2003 slogan, “Diesel nahin ab khadi se; diesel milega ab baadi se” (Diesel will no more be imported from the Gulf; it will be produced in the backyard). Years later, people realised it is not the “green gold” that it was made out to be. Singh’s claim that by 2014 the state will be self-sufficient in biofuel production never came true. “One million people were supposed to get employment. However, the plan for establishing biodiesel industry did not take off. We are still buying fuel at 85 per litre,” says Tulsiramji Sahu, former sarpanch of Seoni Khurd in Dhamtari district. Lokdhar Sahu, a resident of Bhothli village in Dhamtari district, where the government had planted jatropha on 20 ha, says plantations affected paddy crops as they cut off sunlight and did not let rice grow.
Layered challenges
This story is from the October 16, 2018 edition of Down To Earth.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber ? Sign In
This story is from the October 16, 2018 edition of Down To Earth.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
Already a subscriber? Sign In
The Pill That's Roiling US Drug Regulation
The hard right is challenging FDA's authority to regulate drugs with its lawsuit to ban America's most used abortion pill
TURN OVER A NEW LEAF
The young leaves of pilkhan free are a worthy alternative to leafy vegetables in the spring season
FAIR PRICE
Using a calculator, Uttar Pradesh scientifically fixes fee for transporting faecal sludge to treatment plants
THE FOREVER POLLUTANT
From production to usage to disposal, plastic is a threat to those who come in its contact SIDDHARTH GHANSHYAM SINGH
Seeds from the past
For a decade,200 villages in Odisha have conserved and grown 190 indigenous rice and millet varieties with proven climate resilience
TESTING TIMES
While the world is trying to identify uniform tests to measure soil biodiversity, it still needs investment and infrastructure to make them available to all
BREAKING NEW GROUND
Soil health is typically measured by its nutrient content, by presence of elements like nitrogen and phosphorus. No country in the world measures it in terms of soil biodiversity-a counting of underground faunal populations and microorganisms.
PRIME TRIGGER
Heat stress dominates debate on the causes of a mysterious chronic kidney disease that continues to baffle health experts and is on the rise globally
Coral catastrophe
Consistent ocean heating puts global corals at risk of mass bleaching in 2024
CHIPKO A DISTANT MEMORY
Whenever a dictionary of green terms is written, no matter in what language, it will contain at least one Hindi word-Chipko, which means to hug.