The rise in biofuel production has had large demand effects on agricultural markets, especially grains and oilseeds. In 2007 it was estimated that biofuel production used 5 % of world cereal production, 9 % of world oilseed production and 10 % of sugar cane production. About half of the global increase in world grain consumption (about 80 million tonnes) was used for biofuels (FAO 2009).

This increase in biofuel production has become one of the major issues in the debate over climate change and global food security. On the one hand, biofuels are criticized for promoting food shortages, utilise much needed agricultural subsidies, offer little or no greenhouse gas mitigation and drive deforestation in developing countries. On the other hand they are promoted as a tool for economic development that could increase production and revitalise many countries’ agricultural sectors. The cultivation of biofuels as cash crops may lead to increased investment in infrastructure that is needed to support thriving or emergent agricultural markets (Gamborg et al. 2011).

The substantial increases in agricultural commodity prices between 2005 and 2008 have partly been blamed on the conversion of food crops to biofuel. These increases have had negative implications for food security in the short term but also for net food buying countries and particularly for low income food deficit countries (FAO 2009) which raised fundamental questions about food sovereignty and government priorities. It could for instance be asked if countries dependent on food aid such as Kenya and Ethiopia should be selling fertile land to developers for biofuel production (Friends of the Earth 2010). In the long run, however, growing demand for biofuels and the rise in agricultural commodity prices may present an opportunity for promoting agricultural growth and rural development in developing countries. Furthermore the development of environmentally friendly biofuels could promote access to cheaper and safer energy supplies in rural areas which could further stimulate economic growth (FAO 2009).

Food security may be compromised if high yield agricultural lands are used for bioenergy production, pushing agriculture into more vulnerable, lower quality lands (Cushion et al. 2010). Such situations could occur when food growing farmers are forced off their land to make way for biofuel plantations. In Ghana for instance, where 50 % of the population work on the land and grow food for local consumption, Jatropha plantations have forced small farmers and particularly women farmers off their land. Valuable food sources such as shea nut trees have been cleared for bioenergy plantations. Small farmers in Ghana have expressed fears that they will not be able to afford to farm the land or buy food for their families. In Tanzania a similar situation occurred when thousands of rice and maize farmers were forced off their land in 2009 to make way for sugarcane plantations (Friends of the Earth 2010).

Converting forests into bioenergy plantations could also increase the food insecurity of forest-dependent communities. These impacts are, however, often short term and there is potential for biofuel production to have less impact on food security over the longer term. Biofuel production can for instance be beneficial to small producers when they are located far from markets and cannot sell their produce at competitive prices due to transport costs. Food production could be uncompetitive under such conditions making biofuels a better option (Cushion et al. 2010). It is impossible to make broad scale policy decisions about food security and biofuel production that will favour either the one or the other. Such decisions have to be made on a case by case, crop by crop, region by region and even location by location basis (Practical Action Consulting 2009).