China could grow large quantities of crops for biofuels, but a lack of planning and co-ordination may prevent the country from making full use of their potential, the Agriculture Ministry said on Thursday. In a report on crops for biofuels, the ministry criticised some government departments and companies involved for a lack of co-ordination and planning.
"(They) do not have clear enough ideas and mature enough understanding as how to better take into account China's actual situation in pushing forward the development of biofuels," the ministry said in a report posted on its Website (www.agri.gov.cn).
"Some areas still lack overall and scientific planning in developing biofuels. Particularly for corn-based ethanol producers, there is a tendency of blind development," the ministry said. Some enterprises thought only about economies of scale, while failing to take into account transport problems, it said.
The report comes as Beijing looks to brake back the country's ethanol drive because of worries over inflation and food security, prompted by surges in corn prices in recent months. China is the world's number three ethanol producer after the United States and Brazil. Its four authorised fuel ethanol plants use corn and wheat as feedstock.
The ministry said China had yet to set up a mechanism, including investment incentives, to develop new crop varieties and to improve crop yields so that biofuels would not eat up the country's food supply or other strategic crops, such as cotton.