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Wetlands for water and life

Sugar cane plantation

Palm oil plantation

Wetlands and Biofuels

Biofuels or agrofuels are crops that are produced for energy production. Globally, biofuels demand and production is rising rapidly. Biofuels can provide a sustainable alternative for fossil fuels, but often also lead to loss of natural areas, massive greenhouse gas emissions, or compete with food production.

Peatlands and palm oil video

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Good or bad?

Biofuels can be a sustainable alternative for fossil fuels. They can also be a threat to sustainability. The demand for enormous areas of land and water is a new pressure on remaining natural areas. Research by Wetlands International showed that biofuels are responsible for huge carbon emissions due to peatland conversion and degradation. Furthermore, it showed that biofuel production leads to the loss of many wetlands in Africa, Asia and South America. 

We see biofuels as an opportunity for sustainability, but only if production does not lead to higher food prices or food shortages, environmental degradation or loss of natural areas. Biofuels made of waste, produced on idle lands, or produced through an increase in production qualify for this.

What we do

  • Wetlands International is a member of the greenhouse gas committee of the Roundtable on Sustainable Palm Oil (RSPO). In this role, we are advocating a certification scheme with social and environmental criteria. Our aim is to have emissions due to the use of peatlands for palm oil recognized. If we succeed, this will, for example, exclude palm oil from peat as a biofuel in the EU.  Such palm oil will exceed the threshold set in the environmental criteria in the EU Renewable Energy Directive.

  • We demand attention and push for a resolution on the adverse impacts of biofuels at the Convention on Biodiversity, the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands and the UN Framework Convention on Climate Conference.

  • We advise governments from both producing and importing countries on sustainable biofuel criteria and management.

  • We address the European Commission with advice on the implementation on the Renewable Energy Directive.

  • We directly engage with the corporate sector (cooperation with the palm oil sector to advise on good and bad practices).


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Wetlands International Headquarters. Horapark 9, 6717 LZ Ede. The Netherlands.

Tel: +31 (0) 318-660910 Fax: +31 (0) 318-660950

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