Opportunities for and obstacles to sustainable biodiesel production in Argentina

The present paper is a synthetic version of the extensive study An Analysis of the Obstacles to the Development of a Sustainable Biodiesel Industry in Argentina [1] [Asal and Marcus, 2005a], conducted in Argentina from October to December 2005 in collaboration between the University of Paris-Dauphine, France and the Instituto de Ingeniería Rural INTA, Argentina. The objective of the study is to analyze what is to date regarded as the most probable development scenario of the biodiesel industry in Argentina in the short, medium and long terms, and to identify the expected discrepancies with an ideal contribution of this sector to sustainable development. Taking into consideration the impact of a draft law that was expected to be voted shortly at the time the study was made, and as effectively happened in April 2006 [2] , creating the incentives and framework for the development of the biodiesel industry in Argentina, the “sustainability” of the corresponding scenario is analyzed from five points of views: economic, environmental, social/cultural and technical/agronomic (the institutional/political aspect has been studied in the original report, but is not reported on in the present article). The conclusion of the analysis is a set of proposals that aim to provide some ways of improving on the expected scenario.