More jatropha news, this time out of Tanzania: The government there has decided to halt all biofuel investment projects for fear that they will result in farmers being removed from their land to make way for crops planted in poorly regulated schemes.
The big problem with biofuel projects in most of Africa is that farmers are told that there will be a market for the seeds, when in fact there is not. It is just that simple. There is no infrastructure for farmers -- most of whom do not even have cars -- to bring their seeds to buyers, and there are very few people to buy the seeds anyhow. Jatropha may someday power lamps and stoves, but it will be a very long time before that happens on a scale that makes growing it worthwhile. There are bigger projects that do not involve small-scale farmers, but, as in Tanzania's case, they often involve kicking farmers off their land, which may amount to much the same thing.
In Kenya, the drought has been so bad that it doesn't really matter what people plant because nothing is growing. But when the rains improve, and there is still no market for jatropha, farmers will certainly feel the sting.
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