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EMAIL PRINT SHARE Zimbabwe: Green Fuels - National Interest Must Prevail

4 MAY 2012

OPINION RELAT ED T OPICS THE unfolding saga over Green Fuel's Chisumbanje ethanol fuel Zimbabwe project makes for some sad reading indeed, giving the Zimbabwe: Tsvangirai impression that the country is jinxed when it comes to INFOCUS: Zimbabwe » Loses Court Challenge investment,sorting out its fuel security. Energy Green Fuel, a 70-30 joint venture between private investors Tanzania: Lack of led by Billy Rautenbach on the one hand and government on Easter Road Accidents Investments Blamed the other, appeared to have been a panacea not only to the Claim 50 in Zimbabwe for... country's fuel challenges when it was launched two years ago At least Fifty people were but also to the economy as a whole, starting with the Lowveld killed while 273 others were injured in ... ADS BY GOOGLE in which the project is sited. What with the 5000-odd people that would be directly and indirectly employed by the project. Zim Holds Investment EU- Summit Biokraf tstoffpolitik What with 500 or so farmers whose business boosted by the The Zimbabwean Analyse der EU- project's demand for at least 50 000 hectares to be put under government is looking to Vorschläge sugar cane. And consider the 120 megawatts that would be build investment partnership with its ... zurBiokraftstoffförderung generated from burning bagasse, the waste from cane once durch DBFZ its sap has been extracted. Mugabe in New Bid for www.ufop.de Early Polls This was said to be enough to power the whole of the The High court is expected AD Feedstocks Manicaland province in which Chisumbanje is located. And what to break the election date Anaerobic Digestion of the multiplier effect of all these activities? To cap it all, impasse between the ... FeedstocksBulk crude US$600 million was to be spent in the venture, which would glycerine - all grades www.fayreoaks.co.uk fully become government-owned after 20 years under a Build, Operate and Transfer (BOT) system.

In terms of its core business, the plant could produce up to 2,8 million litres of fuel daily, nearly three times Zimbabwe' daily requirements, which fuel had the further advantage of being environmentally-friendly, hence the word Green in Green Fuels. The surplus, of course would be exported, earning the country the ever-scarce foreign currency. Could Zimbabwe, which was coming out of economic doldrums, ask for more?

However, the ethanol plant is threatening yet another white elephant.

Elsewhere in this issue, we are told that government has thrown out Green Fuel's proposals for the compulsory blending of the ethanol it produces with ordinary petrol. Green Fuel general manager Graeme Smith was this week quoted as saying the company was lobbying government to put in place ST ORIES: Zimbabwe » legislation to compel all oil companies to blend their fuel with locally-produced ethanol. MOST READ

Such an approach, though, smacks of the very 1. Zimbabwe: Sokwanele Predicts 1. Zimbabwe: Sokwanele Predicts authoritarianism that has become an anathema in Zimbabwe Zanu-PF Victory in Harmonised Polls through acts such as Posa, Aippa, land reform laws and indigenisation acts. Energy minister Elton Mangoma has a 2. Zimbabwe: Gono Speaks On Gold point in indicating that that Parliament should not enact laws Coins to help individual companies make a proﬁt. That would set a 3. Zimbabwe: Investment Summit bad precedent. Begins

However, it is very important for the nation to support the 4. Zimbabwe: End the Tolerance On Green Fuel initiative, given its economic advantages outlined Our Country's Roads above. After all, this is not the first time Zimbabwe has resorted to blending ethanol with imported petroleum. During 5. Zimbabwe: Zim-SA Trade Deficit the sanctions busting era of UDI an ethanol plant was set up Tops U.S.$530 Million and this received a new lease of life in 1983 following the fuel 6. Zimbabwe: With a Radio Ban, crisis of 1982. Mugabe Sharpens the Old Enemy's Weapon A blend of ethanol from that plant and petrol is what Zimbabwe had been using ever since. What has been labelled 7. Zimbabwe: Massive Defections as "blend" at all service stations is in fact the very same type Loom At MDC-T of product that Green Fuel is producing. It's only at the height of fuel shortages during the hyperinflationary era that the see more » majority of Zimbabweans began using unleaded petrol, as MOST COMMENTED shortages implied that deliveries had to be made immediately, obviating the need for blending. Prior to that, unleaded petrol MOST EMAILED had been used only by the elite as it was more expensive. TOP NEWS It appears this is where Green Fuel has failed. Its product has been priced in such a way that it is uncompetitive. Given the ZIMBABWE INDEPENDENT small price differential (US6-8 cents per litre) between Green Fuel's E10 (the old blend) and the longer lasting unleaded petrol, the average motorist will opt for unleaded. FOLLOW ALLAFRICA In Brazil, the largest producer of ethanol in the world, ethanol producers get subsidies from government since they are an entire industry and not an individual company. Zimbabwe cannot afford that. Green Fuels has to come out in the open about its cost structure so that viable prices can be charged.

But above all, the project must be viewed as a national economic venture and not a theatre for politicians to settle scores and indulge inself aggrandisements.In the end, national interest - not individual agendas - must prevail.

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