INTERVIEW WITH PROFESSOR JOSE ESQUINAS, AGRONOMIST, CORDOBA, SPAIN BROADCAST AUGUST 5TH, 2008.

COMMENTARY

Another delivery of wheat, this one destined not for the flour mill, but for the biodiesel plant.

Many countries are looking to biofuels as a solution to rising oil prices and diminishing reserves.

But growing crops for fuel has caused alarm among many who say we cannot afford to divert agricultural land away from food production.

They say that rising food prices are a direct result of biofuel production.

But others say that a far greater threat is our agricultural system itself in which we grow just a few varieties of crops, ignoring the hundreds that exist.

Jose Esquinas is a champion of biodiversity. An internationally respected authority on plant genetic resources, he believes that we must preserve the whole spectrum of crop varieties, or face disaster.

Euronews met Professor Esquinas in his home town of Cordoba, Spain

INTERVIEWER

"There has been a lot of debate recently about biofuels and they've been blamed for causing rising food prices. How true is that?"

JOSE ESQUINAS

"There is an impact and they are therefore partially responsible. How much responsibility depends on different estimations using different calculations done by different people. These range from 10% to even 60%, a figure which was mentioned in a recent unpublished report prepared by one of the leading economists of the World Bank."

INTERVIEWER

"There is another aspect to biofuels in that they encourage monocultures."

JOSE ESQUINAS

"When we have plants that are identical, they may all be resistant to certain diseases, but they may be vulnerable. If they happen to be vulnerable, when disease arrives the whole area planted with that variety disappears. You have a classic example with the Irish Potato Famine in the 19th Century. The whole of Europe was growing a single variety of potatoes and when Phytophera infestans - that was the disease - appeared potatoes were practically eradicated from Europe with tragic consequences in countries like Ireland where more than 2 million people starved to death and another 2 or 3 million had to migrate to the United States. The consequences were terrible and there was no pesticide or chemical product to resolve the problem. The problem was resolved by someone saying, "Oh, what about if we go to the centre of diversity of potaoes?" That was in Latin America.

INTERVIEWER

"You said that the northern hemisphere is reliant upon the southern hemisphere for 90% of its genetic resources, is it really as high as that?"

JOSE ESQUINAS

"Number one, there is interdependence between all countries. No single country is self-sufficient in this matter. The average dependency is around 70%, but the north is more dependent than the south. The north depends on the south in many cases for more than 90%. Therefore, international cooperation in this area is not a choice, it's a must, in order to face unpredictable environmental change and human needs."

INTERVIEWER

"In the future we are going to have enormous pressure on us. Our population will be double what it is now, the need for more land to grow food, the need to use some of that land to grow fuel, diminishing fossil fuel supplies - what can we do to stave off the threats that seem to be imminent now?"

JOSE ESQUINAS

"I wish I had the answer to this question. There is not a single answer actually. It depends a lot on where we want to go, which kind of future do we want to construct. To go in the direction that we choose, we have more instruments than ever before - from resources to technology - we will be able to construct the future in the way we want. The point is which kind of future do we want to construct, taking into account several things: number one, we are a single little planet called Earth and we are intrinsically linked to each other, people and countries. If our little boat Earth gets a hole, we can all sink, no matter if the hole is in the United States, India or Spain, it will affect all of us - therefore we are able to save all or perish all of us together."

INTERVIEWER

"We know that we're running out of fossil fuels, but I don't think that anybody feels that their food supplies are vulnerable and what can we do about it?"

JOSE ESQUINAS

"We could try to reduce the loss of genetic diversity by having a slightly different agro-food system. We don't need to produce the same varieties everywhere. On the contrary, it would be good to have varieties that are more locally adapted. That does not mean we should not have new commercial varieties, but we should not have just a few to be internationally spread, but we should have varieties adapted to local needs, the local agro-ecological conditions and the taste of local communities. I think at this moment of scientific development we could afford to concentrate our efforts at a more local level."

ENDS