Might Jatropha curcas be a biofuel of the future for developing countries?

"It was the last oil crisis that prompted this international enthusiasm about jatropha. Since then, the interest has subsided a bit ", says Roland Pirot*, a CIRAD researcher.
In the 1940s, the plant was already being used as a fuel in Africa. Over there, it is known as physic nut, and is traditionally held to have many virtues. Its latex contains coagulant and healing substances that are used to treat wounds. Its oil is a purgative and is also used to make soap, while the presscake can be used as a fertilizer. Its deep root system helps to fight soil erosion, while jatropha hedges are traditionally planted around market gardens to shield them against animals.

India was one of the first countries to look more closely at jatropha as a fuel, towards the end of the 1990s. That said, as Gilles Vaitilingom** points out, "development projects were planned in Africa in the 1980s, but never came to anything ". While jatropha is a hardy plant that grows in arid areas, it does require at least small amounts of water and fertilizers and "does not give exploitable yields for at least four to five years ", according to researchers, particularly as like cotton and coffee, it has to be harvested by hand due to its staggered flowering.

Short production circuits in Mali
In 2007, CIRAD, in partnership with the French firm Agrofuel, launched a research and development project on the use of jatropha oil either pure, for engines, or as an ester or biodiesel. A bibliographical study of jatropha production was conducted, and an experimental station was set up in Mali. In 2009, funding was awarded by the Fondation Tuck to run until the end of 2010, and the project is continuing with a Malian partner, the Association d'Entraide pour le Développement Rural. The aim is to make the Teriya Bugu ecotourism resort self-sufficient in energy terms, by using the jatropha oil produced by the region's farmers in its generators.
Malian farmers are closely associated with running the resort, and have already planted the equivalent of 50 hectares of jatropha, in small plots or hedges on their farms.
This new project aims to enable the development of a real "local economic fabric ", and the creation of local production chains and economically worthwhile rural activities. It is an example of Malian short production circuits that CIRAD researchers are currently assessing.

CIRAD's experience of field trials has also been called upon by the University of Wageningen (Netherlands), for the agronomy component of the EU JATROP project, which is due to be launched in 2009 and will involve research organizations in both North and South, along with private firms.

* agronomist with the CIRAD Annual Cropping Systems Research Unit

** energetics specialist with the CIRAD Biomass and Energy Research Unit