Land suitability and availability for biofuel feedstock production in sub-Saharan Africa

Dr Helen Watson

South at the Steering Wheel - Improving sustainability in land investment for bioenergy in sub-Saharan Africa

SEI/SIANI Workshop in Stockholm, May 29, 2012

Numerous attempts to identify where best to grow specific biofuel feedstocks

1978 FAO Agro-Ecological Zones (AEZ) methodology standardized framework for assessing whether the climate, soil & terrain conditions prevailing within 10 km2 grid cells are suitable for sugarcane (2004)

2009 FAO & IIASA suitable for the commercial, fully mechanized production of rain-fed sugarcane as a bioethanol feedstock. Same AEZ methodology but more climatic parameters, longer records, & better resolution terrain data enabled use of water balance & crop models to estimate the actual evapotranspiration, length of growing period, and potential crop & biomass yields for each 10 km2 grid cell.

coarse resolution over-emphasizes influence of large areas with good rainfall & misses smaller areas with adequate rainfall. Most African countries do not have long term, data on the wide range of climatic parameters needed to predict yield performance. So ? Virtually identical & useless as 2004 map

E3- maize, sorghum, rice, cassava, sweet potatoes, sugar cane, peas, citrus, mangoes, pine apple, cashew, ground nuts, soya bean, sunflower, tobacco, cotton, sisal, jatropha. grasses & legumes for animals

P2- sorghum, sisal, jatropha

N6- too short growing period for crops, strictly managed livestock grazing of natural grasses

FAO AEZ methodology: rainfed sugarcane 4 km2 = 5.90% or 51 844km 2 FAO 10 km2 =0.99% or 8 699 km2

Not just a resolution issue !

Availability ?

• Filtering out unavailable & unsuitable land using GIS & global 1km2 databases quick, cheap & effective for identifying where land is potentially available & suitable

• Accuracy effected by:

1. Unfenced PA not representative

2. Temporally dynamic savannas

Land occurring in strictly protected areas (PAs) where agricultural use is not permitted, HAS to be excluded. These areas outside of PAs should also be excluded: a)wildlife movement corridors, b)areas where there is conflict between humans and wildlife, or between humans,

high conservation value areas (HCVs) viz; natural forests, woodlands, grasslands, riparian areas & wetlands that are important for ecosystem services & /or providing natural resources for rural communities, IBAT limited value because of resolution & out of date inventories

Rather than converting land that is currently being used for food and /or cash crop production, or for grazing to biofuel feedstocks, incentives should be made available to encourage use of abandoned or degraded land.

routes used by nomadic pastoralists, climate change

Exclude areas that are of archaeological, historical &/or cultural significance. Once land areas are identified as both suitable &available for biofuel feedstock production, they need to be analyzed in relation to their proximity to infrastructure (roads, railways, and electricity grid),

Schut et al. (2010)

population density, literacy and poverty levels, & existing biofuel processing and storage facilities. Importance of field verification & active stakeholder engagement throughout process.

Thank you for your attention

IF WE DO IT RIGHT –

THE FUTURE IS

BRIGHT