Assessing the “food-fuel-forest” competition in Brazil: impacts of sugarcane expansion on deforestation and food supply

biofuels present promising opportunities for Latin-American countries, since most countries in the region have a strong potential regarding biofuel production. However, the technology is not without costs. Biofuel production has faced criticisms regarding its environmental and social impacts. Most of them are related to indirect land use changes due to biofuel expansion. This paper aims at presenting an overview of the empirical literature on the environmental impacts of sugarcane ethanol production in Brazil. In addition to that, we develop a land use model in order to assess the potential competition between food production, biofuel expansion and deforestation. Our empirical findings do not provide support to the argument that sugarcane expansion may lead to food supply disruption. Moreover, sugarcane expansion does not seem to represent a potential source of deforestation pressure in the Amazon. On the other hand, enlargement of sugarcane area in the Center-South region _ which is the main expansion axis _ may induce deforestation. This is of particular concern in the cerrado biome (Center-West region) and in the remaining Atlantic rainforest areas (Northeast and Southeast coast of Brazil).