"[T]here is already a relatively significant installed capacity for production of ethanol in Central America, especially in Guatemala, El Salvador and Costa Rica."
By Patricia Grogg
HAVANA, Jun 23 (IPS) - The countries of Latin America are turning more and more to plans for the use and development of ethanol, or alcohol made from sugar cane, as they are feeling an ever-pressing need to diversify their sources of energy for economic and environmental reasons.
Colombia, one of the countries most advanced in this respect after Brazil, the region's undisputed leader, now produces between 900,000 and one million litres a day of ethanol. In 60 percent of the national territory, the petrol sold is a mandatory blend containing 10 percent ethanol.
"The idea is to extend that to the entire country," Julio Ce'sar Vera, director of hydrocarbons in the Colombian Ministry of Mines and Energy, told IPS. "We have already begun to carry out studies for raising the proportion of alcohol in petrol to 20 percent over the next five to 10 years."
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"In economic life there is extreme inequality and exploitation. Although colonialism no longer exists openly in the political and economic sphere, still it persists indirectly, and this should not be tolerated... In this respect you should remember that in economic life, we will have to guarantee the minimum requirements of life to one and all... There cannot be any sort of adjustment as far as this point is concerned. The minimum purchasing requirement must be guaranteed to all. Today these fundamental essentialities are not being guaranteed. Rather, people are being guided by deceptive economic ideas like outdated Marxism, which has proven ineffective in practical life and has not been successfully implemented in any corner of the world. Why do people still believe in such a theory, which has never been proved successful? The time has come for people to make a proper assessment of whether they are being misguided or not." |
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"Human beings have still not been able to form a human society, and have still not learned to move with the spirit of a pilgrim. Although many small groups, motivated by self-interest, work together in particular situations, not even a small fraction of their work is done with a broader social motive. By strict definition, shall we have to declare that each small family unit is a society in itself? If going ahead in mutual adjustment only out of narrow self-interest or momentary self-seeking is called society, then in such a society, no provision can be made for the disabled, the diseased or the helpless, because in most cases nobody can benefit from them in any way... in that case there always remains the possibility of some people getting isolated from the collective. All human beings must attach themselves to others by the common bond of love and march forward hand in hand; then only will I proclaim it a society." |