SOCIAL ACTION BIOEX ETHANOL- Sweet potato-to-Ethanol & Food: an option to the small farm business The great motivations for the sweet-potato ethanol production are the social and environmental benefits that this kind of new fuel can bring. However, in reason of the different levels of economic and social development of the countries, these benefits must be reflected differently. Social Benefits The great powerful Brazilian and world-wide market will be able to support this great program of generation of job and income from the production of sweet-potato ethanol. Studies developed for the Agrarian and Development Ministry, the Ministry of Agriculture, Cattle and Supplying, Ministry of the National Integration and Ministry of the Cities show that if we substitute 1% of diesel oil for bio-diesel we will generate about 45 thousand jobs in the field with the participation of familiar agriculture, with an annual average income of approximately R$ 4,900, 00 for job and the same is applied to the sweet-potato ethanol. If we admit that for each job created in the field we will generate 3 jobs in the city, we can get approximately 180 thousand jobs. In an optimistic hypothesis of 6% of participation of familiar agriculture in the bio-diesel market, it would be generated more than 1 million of jobs. In the following lines we will have the comparison between the creation of jobs in the enterprise and familiar agriculture. In enterprise agriculture, we have one worker for each 100 hectares cultivated, whereas in the familiar agriculture the relation is just 10 hectares for each worker. To each 1% of participation of this segment in the bio-diesel market, it is necessary to take in account approximately R$ 220 million per year in resources, which provide an addition of annual gross income of R$ 470 million. So, for each R$ 1,00 applied in familiar agriculture can generate an additional of R$ 2,13 in the annual gross income, it means that the familiar income would fold with the participation in the market of the sweet-potato ethanol. The data above show clearly the importance of prioritizing familiar agriculture in the sweet-potato ethanol production. The sweet-potato production in familiar crops makes the ethanol an important alternative for the eradication of the misery in the country, because of the possibility of occupation of enormous contingents of people. In the semi-arid northeastern region live more than 2 million of families in very bad life conditions. The social inclusion and the regional development, especially via job and income generation, must follow the basic orienting principles of the actions directed to ethanol, this situation implies that its production and consumption must be promoted in a decentralized form and not-excluding in terms of technological routes and the raw materials used. The Brazilian Hunger Zero Program “Programa Fome Zero” of the Presidency of the Republic created the “Bolsa Família”, a program of income transference destined to the families in poverty situation. The benefits granted for the government are of until R$ 95,00 monthly for family. If these families will be joined in the sweet-potato ethanol program, we can have US$ 18,4 million of economy of direct subsidies that can be paid by jobs generation. So, the substitution of 1% of gasoline for sweet-potato ethanol generates a positive externality of almost US$ 100 million in job and income that must be compared with the resignation subsidized tax to give competitiveness to the product, according to the social inclusion program for the use of the bio-fuel of the government. Jobs and the sweet-potato The soybean agribusiness generates direct jobs for 4,7 million people in many segments, of input, production, transport, processing and distribution, and in the productive chains of swine and poultry. It is about a production of 52 million tons in 20 million hectares, in the total, direct and indirect, four hectares for person. Dendê (palm) is not too explored in Brazil. In Malaysia this product make it possible the agrarian reform. The areas with bigger aptitudes are plotted by Embrapa. There is an area of 69,9 million ha with high/middle aptitude for the dendê culture (degraded areas of Amazon forest).

For dendê and mamona production, the numbers of jobs direct jobs (without involving all productive chain), are the following ones: an example for dendê, with 33 thousand hectares planted and 25 thousand in production, uses 3 thousand direct jobs. In “assisted” familiar agriculture, dendê counts on a family for 10 hectares. In mamona crops we can consider a worker for each 10-15 hectares (also only for the agricultural production).

In semi-arid regions, for example, the liquid annual income for a family who grows five hectares of mamona and has an average production between 700 to 1,2 thousand kilos for hectare, can vary between R$ 2,5 thousand to R$ 3,5 thousand.
Moreover, the area can be joined with other cultures, like beans and maize.

Surveys indicate that, in 2004/05 harvest, 84 thousand hectares will be cultivated with oil grains for familiar farmers for the production of bio-diesel, which 59 thousand are located in Northeastern region of Brazil. The culture of the total area involves 33 thousand families, which 29 thousand ones are from the northeast region.

Brazil has 17 million hectares of native forest of babaçu, where the women workforce (they are called “quebradeiras de coco”) is the mainly one in an excluding social system (income of R$ 3,00/day, beyond occupational illnesses). These forests have been object of devastation for use of the land for other ends, due to low income gained for the coconut collection.

The sweet-potato presents advantages in relation to all the mentioned cultures. First of all, because it provides 170 the 190 liters of sweet-potato ethanol with the BIOEX technology, with the productivity of 40 the 50 tons for hectare, with 28 - 30% of starch, with the non-polluting humid residue, of approximately 300 (three hundred) kilos used for swine, goat, poultry, cattle and fish feeding, and it is also used in natura. Its residue has more than 16% (sixteen percent) of protein, practically the double of the protein found in maize.

It is possible to join the ethanol production with the animal protein generation feeding the familiar farmers and generating an extra income in the production of bio-fuels.

Familiar agriculture

The familiar farmers are defined by the Operational of the Agricultural Credit Manual, Pronaf (2002), as the agricultural producers that take care of to the following requirements:

• They are the owners, the person who rents the farm, partners or concessionaires of the Agrarian Reform;
• They inhabit in the property or next to the place;
• They have, in any way, in the maximum 4 (four) fiscal modules of land,quantified as the legislation in vigor;
• At least 80% (eighty percent) of the familiar gross income must be proceeding from the farming or not farming exploration of the establishment;

• The base of the exploration of the establishment must be the familiar work.
There are about 4,13 million familiar farmers in Brazil and it represents 85.2% of the agricultural establishments of the country. 49.6% of theses farmers are placed in the Northeast region and they are the poorest ones. There are 475,779 seated people in the country, in 6067 farm places.

Familiar agriculture represents more than 84% of the agricultural property of the country. Around of 4,1 million establishments. The familiar farmers are responsible for approximately 40% of the raw value of the farming production, 80% of the farming productive jobs and significant part of the food that come to the Brazilian table, like beans (70%); cassava (84%); swine meat (58%); milk (54%); maize (49%); and poultry and eggs (40%).

These producers have suffered throughout the years a process of reduction in their incomes, arriving at the exclusion of agricultural workers of around 100.000 agricultural properties per year, from 1985 to 1995 (IBGE, Farming Census 1995/96). The great part of this process of impoverishment can be explained by little offers and the low quality of the public services directed to the same ones, who could make it possible the social and economic inclusion of these farmers. This problem led, in the last year, to accept as a lamentable reality, that the familiar farmers are social constructions whose aim depends on the projects which involve power forces that are capable to mobilize and implement them.

This situation, derived from its incipient organizational level, from the limitations of its productive bases and from the forms of commercialization, however, it has been reverted for the MDA - that has as ability area the Agrarian Reform and the PRONAF - trying, in its mission, to create chances to the agricultural populations to reach the fully citizenship, and trying to have the future vision of being the international reference of solutions of social inclusion.

Strategy of implementation of the Program

If we consider the basic line of the Federal Government and the State Government to favor the inclusion and the aspects of the social regionalization, we have to consider:

a) starts the program of production and rational use of ethanol in all the regions of the country from the sweet-potato production from proper and consolidated species, to take care of a national and international demand, including the pharmaceutics use, distilled drinks and perfume.
b) The actions of the government need to be prioritized for the Northeast region because it concentrates the biggest number of familiar farmers and for the North region for the potential of the land, especially in function of the possibility of exploitation of degraded areas.
c) Independent of the region, it is important to see that the program must be orientated and not imposed, in function of the different demands in many regions of the country, in order to avoid a “race” to the market, that would provoke a disordered use of the land, concentration of the production and greater social exclusion.
d) It is also important to make it possible the insertion in the market of small e medium decentralized companies, mainly cooperatives. These companies can directly negotiate the resultant residue of the processing with the farmers and exchange operations between ethanol and sweet-potato can be made.
e) The proximity of the stage of production of the sweet-potato for the associated farmers is important because this will imply a bigger price and it also integrate the residue (pie) in the property, diminishing its costs of production and increasing it offers of animal protein, what it improves the nutritional standard of the population.
f) To produce the sweet-potato to the ethanol production for each region it is necessary to consider that inside the same region many species adapt themselves so the diversity must be considered. For example, the Tocantins State will be able to produce from developed potatoes from the Federal University of the Tocantins and the new ones that the BIOEX is launching, with research from the Paraná and São Paulo State, for example.
g) Familiar agriculture is capable to serve plenty the demand of the proposed scenery since that it has access to the market of ethanol of the sweet-potato and, mainly, the program credibility.

Recommendations

In fact, to ethanol be considered a renewable energy program, based on social inclusion and regional development, we need to observe the following aspects:
a) Work the concept-action of ethanol in order to make possible the gradual insertion of some technologies of generation of energy from the biomass (etanólica, metanólica Transesterficação, craqueamento, amongst others);
b) To be preceded of a strategy of decentralization of the production, industrialization and the distribution;
c) To guarantee the access of familiar agriculture to the ethanol market;
d) It is important to propitiate the direct purchase mechanisms to the industry and exchange relations, as well as to make the regionalization of the production and the consumption possible, independent of the politics of the deliverers;
e) To make possible the use of any technological routes that lead the products inside of standards of quality acceptance (including, to consider the standards to be established for the vegetal fuel gotten by ‘craqueamento’);
f) To work the identity and quality standards to do not exclude any raw materials;
g) Prioritize the set of public politics (financing, assistance technique and agricultural extension - ATER, of using the land and support to the commercialization) directed to the production of bio-diesel from familiar agriculture and of the seated ones from the Agrarian Reform;
h) Institutional market (supplying of public agencies and public transport, for example) prioritized to Familiar Agriculture and seated people;
i) Extend all the benefits of bio-diesel production to the familiar agriculture for ethanol from familiar agriculture

Social Fuel Stamp

Beyond the economic and environmental advantages, there is the social aspect, of fundamental importance, mainly if we consider the possibility of conciliating sinergetically these potentialities.

The planted area needed to achieve the mixture percentage of 1% of ethanol to the gasoline is approximately in 1,5 million of hectares, that is equivalent to 1% of the 150 million hectares planted and available for agriculture in Brazil. This number does not include the busy regions for pastures and forests. The rules allow the production from different oil products and technological routes, making possible the participation of the agribusiness and familiar agriculture.
The raw material growing and the industrial production of sweet-potato ethanol, that is, the productive chain of ethanol, has great potential of generation of jobs, promoting, of this form, the social inclusion, especially when the ample productive potential of familiar agriculture is considered. In semi-arid and North Brazilian regions, the social inclusion is still more pressing.

In semi-arid regions, for example, the liquid annual income of a family from the growing of five hectares of mamona and an average production between 700 to 1,2 thousand kilos for hectare, can vary between R$2,5 thousand to R$ 3,5 thousand. Moreover, the area can be joined with other cultures, like beans and maize and, mainly the use of the residue, that is not pollutant, for the animal feeding.
To stimulate even more this process, the Federal Government launched the Social Fuel Stamp, a set of specific measures aiming to stimulate the social inclusion of agriculture, in this important productive chain, as the Normative Instruction number 01, from July 5th 2005. In September 30th 2005, the MDA published the Normative Instruction number 02 to bio-diesel products with perspectives of consolidating themselves as enterprises able to get the social fuel stamp.

The social framing of projects or producing companies of bio-diesel allows to access the best conditions of financing with the BNDES and other financial institutions, beyond of giving right of competition in auctions of purchase of bio-diesel. The producing industries also will have right of disinvesting some tributes, but they will have to guarantee the purchase of raw material, pre-established prices, offering security to the familiar farmers.There is also the possibility of the familiar farmers participate as partners or quota-holders of the oil extracting industries of bio-diesel, from direct form, or by the associations or cooperatives of producers. We hope that this activities must be extended readily for the production of sweet-potato ethanol the programs and benefits of sweet-potato ethanol.

The familiar farmer also will have access to the credit facilities of Pronaf, by banks that operate with this Program, as well as access to the technical assistance, supplied for the proper owner companies of the Social Fuel Stamp, with support of the MDA by public and private partners. In the 2006-2008 harvest the familiar farmers who want to participate of the sweet-potato ethanol productive chain must have the disposal of an additional credit facility of the Pronaf for the sweet-potato culture. With this, the farmer will have a possibility of generating income, without leaving the main activity of food plantation. This new line is going to make the ‘safrinha’ growing possible. The farmers will keep their maize and cassava productions, for example, and in ‘safrinha’ they will make the sweet-potato plantation. The credit limit and the financing conditions follow the same rules of the Pronaf group which the farmer will be fit.

Industrial production

The dimension and the diversity of the sweet-potato ethanol market (fuel, perfume, distilled drinks, pharmaceutical products etc.), substituting the importation that occurs nowadays, will allow the enlargement of the industrial park in all country, making possible the emergence and the evolution of new companies in the sector and many innovative solutions with high standard of quality and technology. The regulation must create the ethanol farmer figure from the sweet-potato, establishing the specifications of the fuel and the structure of the commercialization chain in the bio-diesel molds of familiar agriculture.

Thus, the tributaries benefits, in function of the raw material supplier, will be granted to the sweet-potato ethanol industrial producers that will have the Social Fuel Stamp. The industrial producer will have to acquire the raw material from familiar farmers, beyond the establishing contract with income specification and the period to guarantee the assistance and the technical qualification, to get the stamp provided by the Ministério de Desenvolvimento Agrário (MDA). The farmer need to get the stamp to have financing possibilities, as well as the bio-diesel model.

The Right of using Ethanol in Brazil

The law that authorizes the commercial use of sweet-potato ethanol in Brazil will consider the diversity of available substances in the Country, the supplement guarantee and the quality, the competitiveness in relation to fuel used in Brazil and the inclusion social politics. The rules allow the production from different sweet-potato species and technological routes, making possible the agribusiness participation and the familiar agriculture.

The legal acts that form the law must establish the percentages of mixture of ethanol with gasoline, the quantities of mixture, the form of use and the tributary regimen. The decrees that establish the tributary regimen with differences marked by region plantation region, production category (agribusiness and familiar agriculture), create the Social Fuel Stamp and the farmers do not have to pay the tax (duty-free) “Imposto sobre Produtos Industrializados” (IPI).

The law made by the Agência Nacional de Petróleo (ANP), responsible for the regulation and inspection of the new product, creates the figure of the sweet-candy ethanol producer and establishes the fuel specifications and structure of the commercialization chain.

The mixture of sweet-potato ethanol to the gasoline will be made by the fuel deliverers, in the same way that alcohol is added to the gasoline. The refineries are also authorized to make the mixture and, they will deliver the product to the deliverers, later.

The law also allows specific uses of sweet-potato ethanol, with mixtures more elevated than the established mark, since they have been authorized by the ANP. These experiences will be followed and they will provide information to increase the percentage of addition of the fuel to the gasoline.

The sweet-potato ethanol addition will not demand alterations in the current gasoline engines, like the countries that have already used the product. The engines that will start using the fuel mixed to diesel in this proportion will have the company guarantee.

The Duty Law

The duty rules of bio-diesel concerning the PIS/PASEP and the COFINS determine that these tributes are charged in only one time and the contributor must be the industrial producer of the sweet-potato ethanol. It will be able to opt between a percentage aliquot that is related to the price of the product, or by the payment of a specific aliquot, that is a fixed by the cubical meter of bio-diesel commercialized, as showed in the Brazilian Law number 11,116, of May 18th 2005.

This Law also shows that the Executive Sector will be able to establish coefficients of reduction for the specified aliquot, that could vary in function of the raw material used in the production, of the region of production of this raw material and according to the supplier type (familiar or agribusiness agriculture).

When this Law was regulated, the Decree number 5,297, from December 6th 2004, modified by the Decree number 5,457, from June 6th 2005, established a general percentage of reduction of 67,63% in relation to the established aliquot defined in the Law. This situation determines, therefore, that the maximum aliquot of PIS/PASEP and COFINS sectors that interferes on the gross revenue gained by the producer or importer, in bio-diesel purchase, is reduced for R$ 217,96 for cubical meter, equivalent the federal tax for its direct competitor, the petroleum diesel, extended to the sweet-potato ethanol.

It also established three distinct levels of disinvesting tax to reduce the maximum aliquot of R$ 217,96/m 3, with the introduction of reduction coefficients that vary according to the Law criteria:
• For the bio-diesel manufactured from mamona or the palm produced in the North, Northeast and in the semi-arid regions by familiar agriculture, the disinvesting charge of PIS/PASEP and COFINS is total, in other words, the effective aliquot is zero (100% of reduction in relation to the general aliquot of 217,96 R$/m 3);
• For the bio-diesel manufactured from any other raw material that is produced by familiar agriculture, independently of the region, the effective aliquot is R$ 70,02/m 3 (67.9% of reduction in relation to the general aliquot);
• For bio-diesel manufactured from mamona or the palm produced in the North, Noetheast and semi-arid regions regions, from the agribusiness, the effective aliquot is 151,50 R$/m 3 (30.5% of reduction in relation to the general aliquot).

Financing

The commercial use of the sweet-potato ethanol will have the support of the “Banco Nacional de Desenvolvimento Econômico e Social” (BNDES). The Program of Financial Support of the Bio-diesel Investments* foresees financing of up to 90% of the possible support item with the Social Fuel Stamp and up to 80% for the other projects. The financings programs are destined to all the bio-diesel production phases, among them we have the agricultural, the raw oil production, the storage, the logistic, the sub-products improvement and the machines and equipment acquisition homologated for the use of this fuel and this rule must be extended for the sweet-potato ethanol.

In the direct operations for very small, small e medium size companies, the loans will be corrected by the Interest Tax of Interests of long period “Taxa de Juros de Longo Prazo” (TJLP) more 1% (projects with the Social Fuel Stamp) or 2% a year. For big companies, it will charge TJLP more 2% a year (projects with the Stamp) or 3% a year more. In indirect operations, the interest tax will be identical, but it will increase the remuneration of the bank which did the service.

The BNDES also extended in 25% of the total period of financing for machines and engine equipment acquisition homologated to use, at least, 20% of bio-diesel or raw vegetal oil added diesel. This operation includes vehicles of transport of passengers and load, tractors, harvester machines and generators, what it must be extended for the sweet-potato ethanol.

It will be also offered the percentage of real guarantees, reducing the current 130% for 100% financing value. Moreover, the possibility of dismissal of real and personal guarantees when there will be long period purchase contract of bio-diesel and sweet-potato ethanol purchase.

The raw material production for bio-diesel by familiar agriculture also counts on Pronaf financing lines that provides for this segment, R$ 100 million, in 2005, with possibility of the increasing values. The Pronaf taxes of interests vary from 1% to 4%, what must be extended for the sweet-potato ethanol.
BB ETHANOL of SWEET-POTATO – BB Program of Support of Production and Use of

Sweet-Potato Ethanol

The program aims to support the production, the commercialization and the use of bio-diesel as renewable energy source and generating activity of job and income.
The assistance to the productive sector will be made opening some financing possibilities of investment and commercialization, collaborating for the expansion of the sweet-potato ethanol processing in the Country, from the incentive of the raw material production, the installation of agro-industrial plants and their commercialization.

The Program will benefit many components of the productive sweet-potato ethanol chain in a systemic way: a) In the agricultural production, with costs credit facilities, investment and commercialization, available for agricultural farmer and enterprise financing. b) In industrialization: BNDES Bio-diesel, Pronaf Agri-industries, Prodecoop, Agro-industrial Credit (acquisition of raw material), beyond the available possibilities for the industrial sector.

The main principle used by the Bank in the concession of the credit, beyond the specific requirements of each line, is the commercialization guarantees as much in agricultural production as the bio-diesel and the sweet-potato ethanol.

Boundaries Profits and the Exportation Possibilities

Nowadays, an expressive quantity of ethanol used in perfumes, beverages and pharmaceutical area in Brazil is imported. This fuel is also used as “carburante”, in the public and load transport and it could be produced in the Country from familiar agriculture, fixing the man in the field and generating income, differently of what has happened to sugar cane ethanol that historically generated oligarchies income concentration.

The sweet-potato ethanol allows the boundaries economy based on importation, it is a strategic advantage of reducing the importation dependence. This renewable fuel will have impact in the Brazilian trade balance allowing the importation reduction.

The commercial use of ethanol for pharmaceutical ends, perfume and distilled drinks, beyond the fuel, creates a potential market for the commercialization of millions of liters of ethanol/year, what represents an annual economy of the US$ 100 million in the importation.

Brazil presents real conditions to become one of the greatest producers of sweet-potato ethanol of the world, making use of the soil and weather properly to the sweet-potato growing. Thus, beyond assuring the internal supply, the sweet-potato ethanol produced in Brazil has great potential of exportation.
In a near future, the sweet-potato ethanol will become an important source of boundaries for the Country, added to the cane sugar alcohol as renewable fuel that Brazil can and must offer to the worldwide community.

Technological development

In Brazil a hundred of researchers that nowadays work for the “Universidade Federal do Tocantins” and “Centro de Ensino Superior dos Campos Gerais” developed researches about the sweet-potato ethanol, since the production (including growing and harvest), the use of residues for feeding, for more than one decade, resulting the BIOEX ETANOL, the first company to get the register for the fuel production process landmark. We can say that the Country has already the technological knowledge to start and stimulate the sweet-potato ethanol, in a commercial scale, even so we must continue the research and tests about this kind of fuel, as we must advance in all the technological areas as a form of amplify the competitiveness of the product. To sum up, we just need to improve what we have already got.

In the scope of the National Program of Production and Use of the Bio-diesel, the Technological and Development module is co-ordinated by the MCT, which encloses the constitution of the Brazilian Net of Technology of Bio-diesel, whose target is the consolidation of a management system of joining all the involved actors in the research, the development and the production of bio-diesel, allowing the convergence of efforts and making possible the public investments, what must be extended to the sweet-potato ethanol production.
Another excellent aim of the net is the identification and elimination of technological problems that can appear during the evolution of the National Program in question, what will be made by constant research and technological development carried through in the scope of partnerships between institutions of P&D and the productive sector.

To get these purposes we are going to have five regional and two national workshops, in the next few months. The first national seminar will have also the objective to make the official launching of the company (event), presenting the project to a group of people from the Department of Agriculture of California – USA in September 24th 2007.

During 2008, projects in partnership with States will be elaborated; an Agreement of Cooperation will be firmed between them. This job will allow the mapping the competency installed in the country, serving as base for the structure and the implantation of the Net.

The execution of the projects and other activities in the scope will look for Sector Funds of C&T. New resources are going to be open in 2008. The States are going to participate in this process.

The actions of P&D are divided in the following areas: Agriculture; Productive industrial goods and Processes; Technological routes; Co-products.
In the area of Agriculture the actions are planned and executed in a set with the “FUNDAÇÃO INOVAR”, and the following aims will be followed: pedoclimático zoning; vegetal and oil plant varieties; economy and modeling of systems; processing and transformation.

The actions in the other areas contemplate the following:
1. Program of tests and essays with engines in the direction to evaluate the viability of the gradual increase of the mixture of the sweet-potato ethanol with gasoline.
2. Development (optimizing) of technology for production of the sweet-potato ethanol in laboratory and proper scales to the local productions of sweet-potato, to guarantee the quality and economic factors.
3. Destination and use of the co-products (residue, pie, bran etc.) so the aggregation of value is guaranteed and created other sources of income for the farmers, especially as a way to replace the maize production.
4. Characterization and quality control of the fuel. Characterization of the oil in natura, deriving many raw material fuels and their mixtures, with analysis of the quality according to established criteria and norms. The analysis and quality control will be improved by the methodology development aiming practical and economic advantages.
5. Criteria and forms of the sweet-potato ethanol storage and the mixtures (ethanol & gasoline) will be created aiming to reach of the ideal conditions of conditioning of the product. Research about the period of storage and the necessity of using additives will be done.
6. The structural plans of laboratories and formation of the human resources sector, is important for attendance of the ethanol market demand – in relation to the technical support of the production, quality control of the produced fuel and specialized workforce - whose production will have to occur in different places in the Brazilian territory.

The projects are elaborated and executed with accompaniment and supervision of the MCT, avoiding the efforts repetition, promoting partnerships, adjusting the reality to the National Program and controlling the application of resources, in the direction of optimizing it.

Environment

Research all over the world shows that the greenhouse effect is very harmful to the environment and the use of fossil fuel has increased this problem. To improve the environmental conditions, mainly in the big cities, also means to improve the quality of life population and avoid the government expenses and the citizens in the combat of bad effects of pollution.

The European Community, the United States of America and other countries has been stimulated the replacement of petroleum for another renewable source of energy, including the bio-diesel, because of its expressive capacity of reducing the pollutants emissions and the gases that cause the greenhouse effect.
The attention to the environment is one of the most efficient forms of projecting the name of a country in the international scene, because of the visibility and the increasing importance of the environmental issue.
Moreover, the production of bio-diesel open new ways of getting international financings in good conditions, in the market of carbon credits, under the “Mecanismo de Desenvolvimento Limpo” (MDL), foreseen in the Quioto Protocol.