Food or Fuel?

Last June, we had a forum on "Food or Fuel, friends or foes?"

With the present economic condition of the country, our university has been and will always be aware of what is happening and doing actions to help alleviate the problems. Among these are the fora in different issues. Several government agencies attended together with the researchers and scientists in the university. The students were also there to hear both sides of the issue and ask for questions.

One of the speakers said that there is nothing to argue whether food or fuel even with the present situation because it should be food and fuel. We need fuel to cook our food. We need food to survive. There was also a speaker who said that the results of his research proved that Jatropha should not be used as bio fuel. There was one who suggested that we can ask for our indigenous people to plant Jatropha in their areas and they will sell it to us for lower price because these people are not hungry of money. My seatmate reacted to that and he told me that we will be exploiting our indigenous people if we will do that suggestion which is not really good.

Another spokesperson said that we have plenty of fuel resources, the government only needs to tap these. Also, it had been said in the news that our agricultural lands are being replaced by bio fuel plants and that is why many are against bio fuels. The speaker corrected that issue and said that they will not be using agricultural lands, instead they will utilize the unused lands to plant Jatropha.

Oil price hike leads to increase in fare and prices of other commodities. With the increasing price of rice in the market, it looks like there is rice shortage but many are saying there is rice hoarding. The prices are high but the salaries and wages are not going higher. The typhoons happening in the country just worsened the situation.

Again, it should not be food or fuel, indeed it should be FOOD AND FUEL.