September 12, 2022
Brussels has confirmed that soy and palm oil products will be banned from biofuels as part of an initiative to eliminate deforestation. Biofuels International has reported earlier this year that this move was being planned and this was confirmed by the Federal Minister for Environment and Climate Zakia Khattabi. Khattabi said that following the examples of Denmark, France, and the Netherlands, biofuels made from palm oil will be barred from the transport sector in the country, while soy will be banned as a raw material for transport biofuels from next year. "These fuels, apart from having little or no advantage over conventional fossil fuels from a climate point of view, lead to deforestation, loss of biodiversity, and even human rights violations,” Khattabi said in a statement. The use of palm oil has increased tenfold on the Belgian market between 2019 and 2020 to 231 million litres. “To produce the quantity of biodiesel for the Belgian market, palm oil plantations are needed with a total area of more than 100,000 football pitches. We know from studies that at least half of these palm oil plantations are planted on land that has been deforested in the recent past,” Khattabi stated. She added that this is the first measure taken by Belgium since it joined the Amsterdam Declarations Partnership, an agreement aimed at eliminating deforestation in relation to agricultural commodities by 2025. “This is a first step to stop the negative environmental impact of the federal biofuels policy. The federal government will also reduce the demand for biofuels by focusing on electric and rail transport," she concluded.