EU says can hit biofuels goal without conflicts

By Gerard Wynn

BRDO, Slovenia (Reuters) - The European Union can meet its 2020 target to get one-tenth of all transport fuel from biofuels without adding to soaring food prices and harming rainforests, the EU's environment chief said on Saturday.

EU leaders agreed the target last year in an effort to fight climate change, and ministers are now debating how to reach the goal while avoiding unwanted trade-offs such as stealing land from food production and tropical rainforests.

Scientists at the European Environment Agency, the EU body which advises on the environment, recommended on Thursday that the target be dropped.

EU Environment Commissioner Stavros Dimas acknowledged the EEA report but remained supportive of the target.

"It's well-intentioned. If you have the sustainability provision I think it's perfectly alright," he told Reuters on the fringes of an informal meeting from April 11-12 of 13 EU environment ministers in Slovenia.

The EU's executive Commission proposed in January certain minimum biofuel standards -- or sustainability criteria -- and fresh proposals are expected for an EU meeting on May 7.

The draft standards included a condition that biofuels must cut emissions by at least 35 percent, not threaten rainforests and take account of food prices. Possible new amendments included an emissions cut compared to gasoline of 40-50 percent, various sources close to the talks said on Saturday.

German environment minister Sigmar Gabriel was also supportive. "We can meet the 10 percent target through biofuel production in the European Union (and imports) ... which do not lead to a conflict with food or rainforests," he said.

Soaring food prices, blamed on market speculators, a weak dollar and biofuels, have led to riots in developing countries including Indonesia, the Philippines and Haiti, the U.N.'s Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) said on Friday.

Biofuels are made from crops like corn and sugar, to replace gasoline and diesel. Gabriel downplayed their role in raising food prices, saying demand for animal feed was more relevant.

"There are other factors crucial for rising food prices. The big competition is not between the use of biomass for energy and food but between feed and food," he said.

Dimas pointed out that EU leaders last year had made the biofuels target conditional on production being sustainable.

Europe and the United States subsidize biofuels both to curb emissions of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide and to address energy security by using alternatives to oil.

Last week British Prime Minister Gordon Brown called for a co-ordinated response led by the United Nations, World Bank and International Monetary Fund to address soaring food prices, including examining the impact of biofuels.

The FAO and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) said last year biofuels were "one of the main drivers" for forecast food price hikes of 20-50 percent by 2016.

(Reporting by Gerard Wynn and Ilona Wissenbach; Editing by Catherine Evans.)