Lack of infrastructure to move biofuels to markets impedes African growth

September 28, 2007

Lack of African infrastructure to move biofuels to markets is under scrutiny in an article by AllAfrica.com. “Lack of infrastructure in African countries weighs down opportunities for biofuel use. You can produce it, but if you can’t get it to the users at a reasonable price there’s no point,” a refinery manager for D1 Oils Africa told AllAfrica.

A 300-mile pipeline from Maputo, Mozambique is under development, but in other areas of Africa trucks must be used over unsuitable roads.

African development has come under increasing scrutiny, as projects in Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia and Benin have been criticized by the Africa Biodiversity Network, while jatropha projects are under study or underway in South Africa, Angola and Mozambique. South Africa is set to introduce a biofuels policy this fall and infrastructure will be a topic of concern as crop areas most suitable for biofuels cultivation, i.e. lands not suitable for food cultivation, are unlikely to have received attention from the small African infrastructure investments over the past decades.

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Written by Jim Lane · Filed Under International