By Jessica Cheam
Environment Correspondent
jcheam@sph.com.sg

 

AS A clean energy reporter, I often write about new developments in technologies such as solar and biofuels, but seldom get the chance to get up close and personal with the actual process.

But just a couple of months back, I was given the opportunity  to get my hands dirty, literally, when I was invited to visit a jatropha plantation in - Myanmar.

It couldn't have been a more unlikely destination, and it almost didn't happen because of cyclone Nargis. But fortunately, the damage done to the plantation was reparable and I finally made it to Myanmar where for the first time, where I could touch the plant, seeds, fruits, that I often wrote about. And spoke to the people who made it happen.

So let me give you the context of my visit: Biofuels is an industry that is both full of promise and controversy.

Singapore has a number of biofuels refineries itself, and the EDB has singled the sector as one of the key renewable energy areas important to Singapore's economy.

But on one hand, while biofuels is a key player in the world's future energy mix - one that is renewable and can make our transport fuels cleaner, its development can also lead to deforestation as it competes with food crops for arable land if not managed sustainably.

Amidst this raging debate on the sustainability of biofuels, a second generation of feedstock has emerged - one that uses non-food crops. The jatropha plant, algae, wood mass from plant waste have been singled out as some promising "fuels of the future" as they don't compete with food and can grow in hardy conditions or exist abundantly in other locations.

In Asia, many countries have particularly caught on the jatropha "fever", with China, Indonesia, Malaysia, Cambodia, and Myanmar planting its seed extensively in the hope of riding on the wave of this sunrise industry.

But these feedstocks are also not without its risks. Most are relatively under-researched, and no one knows if full-scale commercial applications of using such feedstocks to make biofuel will be successful yet.

So it is with all these considerations that I went with my eyes wide open to visit the 100,000 acre estate at Maw Tin, in south Myanmar, to get a better understanding of how the industry and this particular feedstock works.

And my experience did not disappoint.

I was happy to learn that biofuels can be cultivated sustainably and responsibly if planned for, right at the beginning.

The plantation was eco-friendly and completely self-sufficient. It had the hallmarks of Singaporean planning and efficiency, if I might say so. And not surprisingly, it had a Singapore connection.

The plantation is the work of Singapore-listed firm Yoma Strategic Holdings, which has a unit, Plantation Resources, which manages and sells produce from this estate in partnership with a local Myanmese firm called Myanmar Agri-Tech.

The plantation has a 650-strong community, mostly local farmers, who go about planting the seeds, harvesting them, sorting the seeds out, and then re-planting them again. When I spoke to Myanmese farm worker Thin Thin Khing, she tells me of her days in the fields.

Six days a week, working from 6.30am to 11am, then 1 to 4pm. Days off for the 29-year-old are spent relaxing with her co-workers in Pathein city, less than half an hour away. She's worked on the farm for more than a year now.

Before this, she says, she had never worked before, and was mainly doing housework for her family. Now, she earns about US$45 (54,000 kyat - the local currency pronounced like "chut") a month - above the national average of US$30.

Breakfast, lunch and dinner are provided on the farm, prepared by cooks who live on the plantation. Their food is also produced on the estate, where beans, rice, vegetables and even domestic animals such as goats and pigs are reared for consumption.

Power for the plantation comes from burning biomass (rice husks) and water is pumped from underground, making the entire plantation almost carbon neutral, save for the diesel used to power vehicles. I even spotted the kids of the farmers riding a baby elephant, which they had tamed from the wild, now used to do menial physical work on the plantation.

I visited the workers' quarters and the kampong-like huts where children and parents of the plantation workers - three generations of a family - were living together in a cosy village setting. It was all very "harmonious" living - nature, wild life, and humans, all on this plantation.   

I was impressed to see the degree of planning involved in the plantation, especially how the way it was run sharply contrasted the reports from NGOs that have surfaced on how the Myanmar government's jatropha drive has backfired on itself.

Organisations such as the Ethnic Community Development Forum allege that Myanmar's junta have used forced labour or confiscated land in some locations. And has directed the entire nation of farmers to plant jatropha wherever they can, without fully understanding the climatic conditions needed to cultivate the plant successfully. 

Chief executive of Myanmar Agri-Tech, Mr Frankie Tan, who oversees all of Yoma's plantations, notes that the junta’s drive has got “good intentions” but lacks a clear roadmap. Farmers are told to plant the seeds, but there is no system to collect them, and also – no refinery to convert the seeds into refined biodiesel.

This is where Yoma's chief executive Serge Pun, a Myanmar-born tycoon who made his fortune in real estate developments across Asia, wants to play a part.

He told me that he hoped Yoma's farm would be a model example for the rest of the country to follow. 

When sourcing land for the plantation, Mr Pun gave strict instructions not to use arable land meant for food. The whole estate was also designed to be self-sufficient, it has an office on site and workers’ quarters for the farmers and their families. It's important for the firm to “do things right and sustainably” if it wanted to be a long-term player in the jatropha market, he said.

And now, Yoma is expanding by implementing a contract farming strategy which will make it the biggest jatropha seed collector in Myanmar. This will possibly salvage the current situation in Myanmar where farmers are stuck with jatropha seeds, but no buyers.

And there's more in the pipeline. Yoma is planning to build a biodiesel refinery in partnership with a major Korean biofuels supplier, Enertech. It will be three miles from Maw Tin, along the Yangon River, and will facilitate both domestic use and export of the biofuel - something that might save Myanmar from spending millions of its foreign reserves on fuel imports ( a top reason why Myanmar's government have embraced jatropha in such a big way). Mr Pun, who has been doing business in Myanmar for 18 years, is bullish about jatropha’s prospects, despite its critics - which is why Yoma has pumped in US$6 million into their jatropha operations in the country so far.

And from what I saw, I'm convinced biofuels can be a sustainable business if done right. The challenge is putting the regulations and/or private sector initiatives in place such that this can be ensured.

When this is achieved, a true win-win situation will benefit all parties involved - and the environment. We'll have a world with fuels that are cleaner, companies that can make a profit supplying it, and a nation of farmers who might find that a seed could be their ticket out of poverty.