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SORGHUM FOR BIOFUEL BUT ALSO AS PEOPLE FOOD

Ethanol is a clean-burning, high-octane fuel. It is produced from renewable sources such as sugarcane. Currently, the country’s demand for ethanol is being filled by Brazil and Australia.

From William Dar, former DA secretary and currently director-general of the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), we learn that sweet sorghum will be introduced here instead of sugarcane for ethanol production. Sorghum’s sweet stem yield is better, at up to 2.5 cropping cycles/year; 810 to 1150 kilograms per hectare. Sweet sorghum and grain sorghum are the same, the former with sugar-rich stalks.

The Philippines is viewed by foreign investors as a suitable site for renewable energy ventures. ICRISAT has introduced five varieties of sweet sorghum of which two were identified to be promising.

Dr. Dar disclosed that four local companies (with foreign partners) have plans to put up bio-ethanol distilleries costing a combined $160 million using sweet sorghum as feedstock.

A US-based firm, Far East Biofuels, had earlier indicated its interest in putting up a bioethanol plant that will make use of sugarcane as feedstock in lahar-ravaged Pampanga.

British-firm Bronzeoak Philippines Inc. had earlier indicated it was setting aside P1.5 billion to put a second ethanol plant that can produce 150,000 liters of ethanol daily in Bukidnon. As the price of petroleum-based fuel in the international market goes up, governments all over the world were prompted to turn to renewable energy sources, such as sorghum, for bioethanol.

As the sweet stem of sorghum is squeezed and turned to bioethanol, nutritionists might look into sorghum grain as a healthier food than white rice. It ranks fifth among the most important cereal crops of the world after wheat, rice, maize, and barley in both total area planted and production. In India and Africa, 80 percent of the area is devoted to sorghum for food grain.

Rice is fastidious, high maintenance, and difficult to grow. Sorghum is the opposite. Grain sorghum is well-known for its capacity to tolerate hot, dry seasons, and to produce during periods of extended drought.

Sorghum leaves roll along the midrib when the air is dry, making the plant more drought-resistant than other grain plants. Sorghum can be grown under a wide range of soil and climatic conditions. Sorghum will yield the same under all conditions. Other grains are less resistant.

Sorghum grows in arid areas where corn and other grains cannot grow without substantial irrigation. Most other grains, like rice, requires perfect environment.

Sorghum is an important part of the diets of many people in the world. It’s made into unleavened breads, boiled porridge or gruel, malted beverages including beer, and specialty foods such as popped grain and syrup from sweet sorghum. In Africa, the straw of traditional tall sorghums is used to make palisades in villages or around a homestead.

The plant bases are an important source of fuel for cooking and the stems of wild varieties are used to make baskets or fish traps. Dye extracted from sorghum is used in West Africa to color leather red.

In pushing sorghum for fuel, might Dr. Dar also push sorghum as cheap healthful food for the malnourished impoverished Filipinos?

Email address: dahli_a@yahoo.com

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