Food crop and cash crop in the battle for renewable energy
Mpolokeng Gaopalelwe
There seems to be myriad reasons
for change in energy direction. The dependence on fossil energy source, which is constantly threatened by the ever diminishing reserves. Also, the salient conflict between the producers and the consumers of the conventional source, viz oil and gas and coal. In South Africa the more pressure than threat emanates from the recent outages. These reasons, inter alia, have prompted the energy revolution debate. The debate centers on the need for the green energy from
renewable resources ie, maize, sugar, non-edible plants such as Jatropha Carcus L and natural resources such as solar and wind. The emphasis is not so much on alternative energy which my include nuclear energy, PBMR. Amid this positive thinking, however, this paper strongly highlights three issues: i. the unintended consequences of the energy revolution - the most common being, unequal competition between food crop production and cash crop production for energy, especially for land. ii. The level of people’s
participation in the project. iii. Benefits of the project, especially to the community.
In conclusion, participation is important in the meaningful success of development projects. Further, rather improve energy efficiency and diversification than replace the conventional with the renewable.