Brazil is launching a $10 million international campaign promoting the use of biofuel from sugarcane as a way of helping its huge alternative-fuel industry, officials said Monday. The initiative, which was signed Monday between the Brazilian trade-promotion agency Apex and the sugar-cane industry association Unica, will run to the end of 2009. The campaign will target the United States, Canada, Europe, and Asia. “The aim is to build an international biofuels market, which currently practically does not exist,” Apex president Alessando Teixeira said. Unica chief Marcos Jank said world biofuel production represents 1 percent of the production of fossil fuels. But Teixeira said demand for ethanol from crops is growing, “and Brazilian ethanol, made from sugarcane, has emerged as the most viable alternative, with competitive advantages over corn, beetroot, and other primary materials.” The United States is the top world producer of ethanol biofuel, making 28 billion liters in 2007, mostly from corn. Brazil was second, with 22 billion liters mostly derived from sugarcane. The biofuel industry is quickly expanding as governments and companies try to lessen dependence on petroleum, which recently has hit record-high prices.
