The Chinese government has since embraced additional biofuel expansion plans. On 7 February 2010, a State Forestry Administration spokesman told the press that the country was ready to devote more than 13 million hectares of marginal lands to biofuels production and several local governments have embarked on or

are planning ambitious long-term oilseed plantation projects. According to blue­prints from the Yunnan Provincial Forestry Department, the province will con­struct 1.27 million hectares of biofuel plantations and aims to become China’s biggest biofuel base by 2015, achieving an annual production capacity of 4 million tonnes of ethanol and 600 000 tonnes of biodiesel. Forty counties in the province have begun to develop biofuel plantations.

The development of the new biofuel plantations will be funded by PetroChina and carried out by forestry authorities at various levels. The biofuel plantations will allegedly be built on marginal lands, including degraded forestlands and croplands, of which Yunnan province alone has more than 4 million hectares, according to a local official.

Next to the development of 13.3 million hectares of biofuel plantations the Chinese government is actively promoting the development of biodiesel facilities and 20 million tonnes biodiesel capacities, which will create enough renewable energy from plant sources to replace 40% of fossil-derived jet fuel of the world. Jatropha has been proven to be one of the viable petro jet fuel replacements.

Jatropha plants have over 300 years of history in China, and are widely grown in the Guangdong, Fujian, Hainan, Sichuan, and Yunan provinces. In these provinces, Jatropha grows in valleys and terrains not suitable for food crops on altitudes between 300 and 1600 meters. Statistically, these provinces have an annual rainfall of 480­2380 mm, which means mountainous terrain, and the average temperature is 18- 28°C. Jatropha plants are a major force in forestation in China.

Over the past decade China has quietly emerged as the world’s third largest biofuel producer. Concerned over rising food prices, China’s central government banned the use of grain-based feedstocks for biofuel production in June 2007. China is the world’s largest producer of rapeseed along the Yang-Tse River and the gov­ernment banned rapeseed as a feedstock for biodiesel. It is reorientating the country’s bioenergy plans toward perennial crops grown on marginal land.

Biofuels have rapidly entered China’s energy policy discourse. Once peripheral to policy, energy crops are now at the center of a broad debate in China that covers energy security, food security, climate change mitigation, international biofuel development, rural development, and ecological restoration. As in many other countries, conflicts between food and energy are at the center of this debate.

12.10.3