Controversies on Jatropha Water-Footprint

In an interview conducted by the 2nd JatrophaWorld Africa team, Mr. Ruud Van Eck, CEO and Founder of Diligent Energy Systems BV opened up and shared some views on the status of Jatropha cultivation today, running a profitable Jatropha business in Tanzania, and adopting sustainable agricultural practices.

He also provided his view on the controversial report by the University of Twente, which claims that Jatropha has the highest water footprint among all the BioEnergy crops. According to Mr. Van Eck, who verified the report with the professor in-charge directly, the sample size used in the study was small, and focused on projects located in high rainfall areas in Asia. Jatropha growing in low rainfall areas like Tanzania was not included in the study, and that grown sustainably, Jatropha does not have as high a water footprint as publicized.
Mr. Van Eck constantly emphasized his strong conviction for sustainable Jatropha cultivation and the future of it for biofuel, and said, “in order for Jatropha to be sustainable, it should NOT be grown in places that can be used to grow food crops.”

His message of sustainable Jatropha cultivation will resonate strongly at the upcoming 2nd JatrophaWorld Africa, which concentrates on optimizing the efficiency and economics of Jatropha, while adhering to sustainability standards. The conference is part of the world’s largest and most influential Jatropha conference series, JatrophaWorld, which has seen participation from over 1700 jatropha stakeholders from industries ranging from plantation owners, jatropha cultivation, jatropha oil producers, biofuel producers, jatropha investors, agrobiotech, technology & machine suppliers and many more from 92 countries.

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