Summary

The recent increase in food and oil prices has brought the question of sustainable energy again on the agenda. Over the last years a lot of attention has been devoted to biofuels as a way to ensure energy security. Both the US and the EU adopted ambitious biofuels strategies, with disastrous effects for the global agricultural markets. This essay argues that biofuels are not an appropriate solution to the food and energy crisis, since they have been identified as the main culprit for the rise in food prices. Instead, developing technologies for energy preservation are much more desirable.