BioShape Tanzania

The activities from BioShape Tanzania Ltd.

Economic colonialism on Biofuel Battleground, ECO-terrorism, the green goldrush or maybe just neocolonialism?

Eco-terrorism is a phenomenon of which environmentally and sustainable words are used to violate the law.

According to an article in the newspaper Daily News Tanzania on December 15, 2009, BioShape Tanzania Ltd.., a wholly owned subsidiary of the BioShape Holding B.V. in The Netherlands, which has been declared bankrupt on June 14, 2010 , belongs to a group of companies in Tanzania guilty of grabbing land from villagers with the pretext to launch biofuel projects. The population was closing agreements in colonial style, is the victim of this practice and condemned to slavery and complete dependence on a biofuel company. Tanzania exports fruit but has to import fruit juice. Tanzania exports olives, but has to import olive oil, simply because the colonialists in the past didn't learn the people how they had to processing food. Nothing has changed yet, the colonialists have still learned nothing.
The Jatropha seeds are exported by BioShape while the country must import expensive oil while tropical forests are felled.
Some influential MP's have warned against the invasion of biofuel companies like BioShape, whose first interest is not to cultivate the land but to export the profits to rich economies in the west.
An interesting article on biofuels and neo colonialism in Tanzania can be found on the African Pambazuka News website.

BioShape Ltd. Tanzania. is headed by Mr Cor Vaes, Wilbert Hermans and Stefan Paes.
Cor Vaes?
Didn't we met that name before?
Yes, because Cor Vaes and his partner were associated years ago with an international hormone scandal.

His financial management company Cor Vaes B.V. came in conflict with the Dutch Ministry of Economic Affairs.
In the years 1997, 1998, 1999 and 2000, Vaes Management Company requested for four different statements, so-called R & D statements. With a R & D declaration the company is eligible for reduced payment of tax and national insurance contributions. The condition is that its own employees do the research and development.

The implementing agency, Senter, however, took action in November 2001 and investigated the books and did detailed administrative research. During the company visit the project folders on the requested and assigned projects were extensively recognized. There is nothing in the project administration where could be deduced that Vaes Management Company carried out own R & D activities , which would be associated with the requested and approved R & D projects. The inspection visit showed that only third-party R&D activities were performed. It was clear that an appeal was wrongly made to the Act reducing remittance tax and national insurance contributions and Vaes has wrongly taken advantage of reducing the payroll tax.
Senter after checking repealed the R & D declarations and Cor Vaes appealed to the Board of Appeals.The case resulted in a lawsuit on April 28, 2004 in which four appeals of the Vaes Management Company were rejected by the Administrative Court.
The ruling is here.
Vaes management Company is also a shareholder of the BioShape Holding B.V.

The article in Daily News Tanzania also mention some other biofuel companies, next to BioShape Tanzania Ltd. these are the German company Prokon PV, the English company Sun Biofuels Plc., and the Swedish SEKAB AB and BioMassive AB.
BioShape Tanzania Ltd.., SEKAB AB, Sun Biofuels Plc. BioMassive AB and concludeBioShape Tanzania Ltd.., SEKAB AB, Sun Biofuels Plc. BioMassive AB closed controversial contracts with local authorities.
BioMassive AB in 2007 signed a contract for 66 years with an organization in Lindi to buy 55,000 hectares of land, but the company has never paid for the land. The complete management went abroad in early 2009, ostensibly to search for investors, but has never returned.
In the Kilwa District, BioShape tanzania Ltd. was accused to grab land by means of unclear contracts threatening water resources and arable land..
An employee of an environmental consultancy firm in Dar es Salaam, Mark Baker wrote:

'In Kilwa, the Dutch firm BioShape rejected land that is labelled barren, or idle, in favour of fertile forest, the Namatimbili, the largest coastal forest in East Africa. Why did they do that if jatropha can grow on weak land? And anyway, what exactly is ‘barren’ land if it is being used extensively by pastoralists?'

It is now clear why BioShape Tanzania Ltd. has chosen the tropical forest above the barren steppes: BioShape was eagerly looking for an alternative source of revenue by tropical hardwood logging, and where do you find tropical hardwood if you do not have jatropha?
In the vicinity of the tropical rainforest Namatimbili hardwood grows enough hardwood, which you can process into exclusive furniture in your own timber factory in Arusha. We're not talking about small quantities. An indication on the BioShape website shows we're talking about 10.000 m³ of tropical hardwood that is felled to make way for the plantations.
BioShape complained that the wood is so hard that the sawmill had to struggle to cut the wood. After some technical assistance from the Netherlands the problems with the saw were solved.
What did the technicians from the Netherlands say about this hard wood?
"We have to cut very hard wood. We have not seen this in the Netherlands. You cannot get a nail inside, and a hammer springs back with the same speed. The blade cuts through like a stick of butter."

BioShape found it no problem to chop the protected specie of Mpingo wood. One can hardly observe any replanting.

The same thing happened to SEKAB.
SEKAB was accused op pumping lots of water in many local environmental sites in Africa , the negative impact that the felling of trees had on valuable local ecosystems and doubtful social results.
SEKAB is also guilty of forgery of the EIA for the Bagamoyo project in Tanzania.
In the original EIA document Orgut warned against the danger of a shortage of water for the inhabitants of the area immediately surrounding the area where SEKAB Bagamoyo had planned her plantations.
Norwegian researchers were aware in March 2009 SEKAB falsified some topics about water resources in the EIA, before SEKAB submitted the EIA at the National Environmental Management Council (NEMC).
The Managing Director of SEKAB in Tanzania, Anders Bergsfors, changed the phrase of Orgut about the danger of a shortage of water. Bergsfors changed the text by saying that a reservoir with a storage capacity of 5 million cubic meters of water would occur where the population of the adjacent areas could get their water.
He didn't say that the water was only available during a short rainy period.
When news reached the Swedish Parliament and the Swedish public SEKAB was unable to raise sufficient funds to get the plantations operational.
In March 2009 the company announced the departure from Tanzania.
SEKAB tried to come back via a circuitous route, or at least tried it. In a press release dated October 23, 2009 SEKAB made aware that all activities in Tanzania and Mozambique would be taken over by the company EcoDevelopments in Europe AB ("EcoDevelopment"). EcoDevelopment however, was led by three senior managers of SEKAB.This was one of the reasons for the government in Dar es Salaam to postpone all applications made by biofuel companies for a permit, for years, including those of EcoDevelopment.

A possible investor trying to achieve a new start for BioShape will have a difficult task because of this measure from the Tanzanian government because a new investor has to deal with a new application for a permit.

See here the EIA which was sent by SEKAB to the NEMC in November 2008.

A British television journalist from the BBC in Tanzania, who also serves several major British newspapers, wrote an article on February 15, 2010 on the The Ecologist website that BioShape has discontinued all activities in Tanzania.
See here for the article.
It says literally:
Like SEKAB, BioShape said that it has now completely ceased operations in Tanzania, for reasons that are unclear. No-one from the company was prepared to comment on its activities.

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New applications suspended, additional monitoring is necessary to regulate the biofuel industry in Tanzania.

In October 2009 the Kenyan newspaper The East African reported in Tanzania more than 5,000 rice farmers threatened to be removed from their land by looting their land by the biofuel industry. Faced with the growing popular opposition among the population and considering the 'move' of Ecodevelopment in the same period, the Government of Tanzania in November 2009 decided to freeze all investments in energy crop projects, not to issue any new licenses and giving no more new land to new foreign investors.

It might have been better if the government in Dar es Salaam listened to organizations like the World Wildlife Fund. The WWF, in late 2008 and early 2009, warned about the method of obtaining land by companies like SEKAB and BioShape Tanzania Ltd. and that this would reduce the arable land where normaly maize and sugarcane were grown.

According to a survey of some employees of the Open University in Heerlen and Eindhoven University of Technology, of which the results were presented in Milan in December 2009 at a workshop on the Evolution of Jatropha Biofuels for Durability, the second victim, after SEKAB, is in the making.The Dutch based company BioShape Holding B.V. with a daughter company BioShape Tanzania Ltd., based in Kilwa, which grows jatropha.
This company acts the same like SEKAB.
The researchers were visiting Tanzania several times. About BioShape they wrote: It planned to remove existing vegetation using heavy duty imported machinery.
The researchers also write about the CO2 balance. BioShape tells the cultivation of jatropha is CO2 neutral and the CO2 balance is in favor of jatropha.
Several bodies began to raise questions whether biofuels were really as GHG-friendly or -neutral as they were initially claimed to be. In January 2008, two articles in Science caused a worldwide stir, pointing out that biofuel energy life cycle studies so far had neglected greenhouse gas emissions due to land conversion prior to start of cultivation. Palm oil plantations established on former tropical forest lands in Malaysia and Indonesia would need to run for over 300 years for the initial carbon debt to be repaid.
Although Jatropha was not yet included in these initial studies, they raised worldwide doubts about the desirability to promote biofuel investments of any sort. It did not take long for these concerns to be reinforced by others. Achten et al.'s (2008) worldwide Jatropha survey asserts: "The caused emission due to removal of (semi-) natural forest is a heavy burden on the initial GHG investment, which will take a significant time span before it is paid back with the GHG emission reduction of the use of the bio-diesel." A survey of environmental life cycle studies of Jatropha biofuels concluded that all of them were deficient in their treatment of land use change. Its own preliminary estimations of GHG emissions associated with the conversion of Miombo Woodland – the dominant Sub-Saharan African ecosystem – into Jatropha plantations confirm Achten’s qualitative conclusions.

This website is trying to tell what's really happening in Tanzania around BioShape. Most of it is confirmed in this scientific report from the OU and TUE.

According to the management of BioShape unfortunately this investigation is not available. The editors of Fibronot.nl note it is in possession of this report and for reasons of copyright it was not published in full. However, there is quoted from.
Whether the BioShape management can find the report or not doesn't imply it does not exist. The BioShape management only want positive things, but if some academic staff of OU and TUE are publishing a negative study, management suggests it might not exist. The BioShape management don't know what's living among many scientists the last couple of years. The opinions about BioShape and jatropha are extremely negative.

BioShape said it is degraded Miombo Woodland where jatropha grows. But the WWF said these degraded Miombo Woodlands do not exist. WWF said for the most part these lands consist primarily of Miombo Woodlands which are valuable Coastal Forests, see pictures below.

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Undoubtly the most beautiful tropical forest in Tanzania is the Namateule / Namatimbili jungle which was not discovered until 2000. The reason for this late discovery was the fact that this jungle is located in the most remote and sparsely populous area in the south east of Tanzania.


The heart of the Namateule / Namatimbili jungle which was discovered only in 2000

The negative publicity in various reports probably became too much for the largest investor in the BioShape Holding, Eneco Energy.
In spring 2009 Eneco Energy reduced its share in the BioShape Holding from 35% to zero percent, after which BioShape experienced severe cash flow problems, and, according to the study of the OU and the TUE BioShape will be forced a fresh start and have to refocus its operations in Tanzania.
Since April, May 2009 it remains very quiet around BioShape Tanzania Ltd. The website is no longer updated since that time, while in previous years almost every daily reports of progress in Tanzania were made. Each filled container with exclusive hardwood furniture, made in Arusha, which was transported to the Netherlands was mentioned. This information is sorely missed.
About illegal logging BioShape has a lot to tell. Trees served as a source of food for decades by indigenous wildlife used to be felled without a permit, as we can read in detail on the website of BioShape:

Today we received some uninvited visitors! Early in the morning we found three elephants in the tented camp. The camp contains a fruit-tree that the elephants take a particular liking to.
Our only way out of this will be to cut down the tree, our employees are terrified of elephants; one of the guards even took his gun and jumped on his bicycle to race off to the next village. Good security!

The Delft University and jatropha

On June 14, 2010 at the Faculty of Technology, Policy and Management (TPM) of Delft University a lecture was organised about Jatropha: The Jatropha Biofuels Sector in Tanzania, 2005-9: Evolution Towards Sustainability?
The lecture would be held by one of the authors who wrote the above report on the Evolution of Jatropha Biofuels for Durability at the Open University and Eindhoven University of Technology.
It may be coincidence, but on the very day that BioShape Holding B.V. was declared bankrupt, suddenly the lecture was cancelled. One of the authors wrote in the report, after the failure of SEKAB in Tanzania, BioShape would be the next victim. The authors were well informed.

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The Bioshape Benefits Foundation

The Benefits Foundation BioShape apparently feels that the funding from the parent company is drying up. The BBF organizes benefit concerts in Brabant, the latest in December last year, which fetched € 22,000. With the a similar benefit concert in April 2009 included, the BBF raised over € 47,000 . Money which should be served for the construction of several projects in Tanzania. But during the last weeks of March 2010 reports from Tanzania say this money is not there and the planned construction of an orphanage was not even started.
It appeared that a sponsor of the benefit concert in April 2009 went bankrupt. To cover the costs of the concert people were asked to pay money on the BBF account...
A growing concern exists in Tanzania if the money raised by two benefit concerts will be used for the purpose it was collected, seen the bankruptcy of the BioShape Holding B.V..
The BBF website is also silent since mid-2009. The exciting stories of the BBF director will be missed. The meetings with the wife of the president, who gave her personal telephone number to the director of the BBF under the slogan "please call me when you need me", the meetings with a host of dignitaries, doctors, mayors, village chiefs and other medicine men, we all have to miss it. One of the last stories was a message about a huge fire in the BioShape office after which a large part of the business administration was burned.

In Tanzania the impression gradually exist that the BioShape Benefits Foundation served as a wheelbarrow to open doors for the parent company BioShape Tanzania Ltd., which the authorities turned a blind eye or looked the other way.
The focus on the BBF website was mainly emphasized on meetings with important people. People who are all too eager to take advantage of the rich uncle from The Netherlands. E-mails originating in Tanzania which are in the possession of the editors of Fibronot.nl show the BioShape benefits Foundation did a lot of promisses more than 1 year ago which are not met. Undoubtly BBF built some projects, but we see no news in the last year. It seems that several projects are in a stage where nobody knows how they end.

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Major international organizations like WWF have criticized the conduct of Tanzania Bioshape

But also local organizations and institutions, ask questions about Bioshape Tanzania Ltd.

The diagram below is the network of Biodiesel Old Boys in Tanzania to see with its distribution networks. It is a situation report of November 2008.

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The WWF table below, there are various companies that are engaged in the production of biofuels in Tanzania. Note the second line in the table: There is doubt about the integrity of the EIA submitted by BioShape.


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Envirocare

An environmental expert in Tanzania, Dr. Abdallah Ramadhani Mkindi and working at the Non-government Organization Envirocare, said over 650,000 hectares is reserved by 16 companies like BioShape Tanzania Ltd., hijacked or just taken away from the original owners, while another row of investors is looking for a further 3 million hectares of land to 'buy'.
A major objection from Dr. Mkindi is these companies export the entire crop of jatropha nuts while the jatropha should actually be reserved for the local population to meet the high demand for energy requirements. The export of readymade jatropha bio-oil is disadvantageous because the oil quickly sours.

Dr. Mkindi says the jatropha hype and the hasty introduction of the jatropha shrubs has resulted in significant increases in farmland prices which are rapidly being bought by both local and international speculators.
Because many land originally was used for the cultivation of crops such as sugarcane, maize and corn, now is used for jatropha, the prices of food increase significantly but the income of agricultural workers drops dramaticly. The Tanzania Daily News on January 23, 2010 announced that prices for sugar considerably increased, and Tanzania in the short term, have to import over 80,000 tonnes of sugar to meet the high demand. Tanzania was, until recently, a major sugar exporting country.

This leads to major problems in the short term. The population will demand government action when the prices continue te increase. It is quite ridiculous that there are over 600,000 hectares of jatropha planting trees on territory that was largely used for the cultivation of food crops, that jatropha nuts largely disappear abroad while the population is faced with a shortage of food due to sharp price increases.
Two organizations working with African nations, Niza and ActionAid International, published a report on February 15, 2010 with the subject: biofuel leads to hunger.
Read the press release here . (In Dutch)

Dr. Mkindi says BioShape Tanzania is in search for 81.000 hectares and has paid for almost 35.000 hectares by mid December 2009 to the District in Kilwa. According to Dr. Mkindi BioShape Tanzania Ltd. will buy one third of the total arable land in the district Kilwa and will lease the land for a period of 50 years.

According to a lawyer and policy maker of the government in Kilwa, Hasnain Dewji, the contract BioShape Tanzania Ltd. has concluded with some village heads are very questionable and he warned that several pieces of arable land BioShape Tanzania Ltd. bought originally were used to produce food.
"We should not allow multinationals to directly enter into contracts with villagers or village leaders without involving the authorities," said Hasnain Dewji.

Even the New York Times spends two articles in October 2009 to focus on the jatropha hype in Tanzania. On October 8 the NYTimes wrote: The African Jatropha hype raises questions , and on October 14, 2009 the NYTimes wrote an article titled: Tanzania suspended investment in biofuels .

According to a previously confidential report from the World Bank, the global push to grow energy plants is responsible for 75% of the increase of world food prices. According to the president of the World Bank, it is clear that action must be taken."We are not witnessing a natural disaster like a tsunami or a major hurricane, it is a manmade catastrophe and as such the human being himself should resolve the problem." The World Bank has a clear cut solution to the problem: Stop making biofuel.
The demand for biofuels, however, was reinforced when the EU decided to maintain the share of biofuels in transport in 2020 to rise to 10%. Local activities such as in a city like Apeldoorn, where the local authorities decided the village should be energy neutral by 2020, created an unacceptable pressure on producers of biofuels who, in spite of everything, continue to produce.

On June 10, 2010 , the EU has announced Europe no longer wants to import biodiesel made from materials which are grown near tropical forests or recently deforested areas, or drained peatland areas with many plant and animal species.
The former scientific director of the agency that the British Government advice to Dr. David King put it this way: "Everything we do in order to subsidize the biofuel industry is in fact that we are subsidizing higher food prices, while doing nothing to tackle climate change."
The English Oxfam Organisation, in the Netherlands not unknown, wrote in a report named, Another Inconvenient Truth , the production of raw materials for biofuel production more have driven more than 30 million people in developing countries in poverty and have increased global food prices unacceptable.
Oxfam also wrote a report on the situation with biofuels in Tanzania: Oxfam Agrifuels-Tanzania

Complaints from the Tanzanian government

Not only the World Wildlife Fund, the IMFLEG, World Bank, Oxfam, a variety of Non Governmental Organisations, dozens of nature and environmental organizations, both nationally and internationally, have strongly criticized the way BioShape affects nature.
Even the ministries in Dar es Salaam are going to interfere with BioShape.

The Ministry of Energy and Minerals in Tanzania recently made a report on the biofuel industry in the country. BioShape gets a slap in the report. The picture below from the report says it all:

Example of unregulated biofuel development, the approach needs to be rechecked

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On the left picture we see a typical dispersion area. In a dispersion area young animals such as lions,
withdraw after staying one year by their parents to live independently.
The management of BioShape calls these areas degraded Miombo Woodlands which you may plow
unabashedly with the largest Caterpillar bulldozers out there.

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The Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) of BioShape

The World Wildlife Fund, WWF, has made an analysis of the biofuels industry in Tanzania. It states among other things about BioShape Tanzania: BioShape made an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA), and has been licensed by the National Environmental Management Council (NEMC). An EIA is roughly comparable to an MER, an Milieu Effect Rapportage in the Netherlands. However, the WWF found a lot of ambiguities in this EIA, see below .

However, there was a site investigation in response to the EIA submitted by BioShape. The Independent Monitor of Forest Law Enforcement and Governance in Tanzania did the field research. Researchers of this organisation worked together with members of the Forest and Beekeeping Division (FBD) and actually looked at places where concessions were granted to BioShape.
Between March 7 and 11, 2009 IMFLEG visited the Kilwa District with special attention to the BioShape plantations and sawmill in Mavuji. On the basis of this fieldwork IMFLEG made a report and after talks with government officials in Kilwa IMFLEG made a report with recommendations how to prevent situations as has occured with BioShape Tanzania Ltd..

Besides the WWF IMFLEG also criticized the EIA made by BioShape.
The criticism involves mainly the authors who have written the EIA. For what is the case?
BioShape has made an EIA by a private company, the Environmental Management Consultants (EMAC).

The most worrying fact is at least one of the authors of the EIA, Dr. CJ Kayombo. He is a botanist at the National Herbarium of Tanzania. This internationally recognized botanist has in no way cooperated with the EIA and issued not a single written word. Actually he was very surprised his name was mentioned on the EIA.
The other two authors were Prof. O.M. Ndosi and Dr. J. Mushy.
According to the Forest and Beekeeping Division in Kilwa (FBD) even two of the three authors did not contribute to the EIA.
On seeing the names of respected scientists, the NEMC probably thought this EIA was excellent, nothing was wrong and in fact gave a permit to BioShape on incorrect data.
Governmental authorities gave advice to the NEMC to investigate BioShape Tanzania to assess the legal validity of the licenses issued including an investigation into possible fraud in the application and granting of licenses.

The Environmental Management Consultants (EMAC) in the northern Tanzanian town of Moshi who wrote the EIA for BioShape received substantial comment on the content of the EIA.
It concerns the Namateule / Namatimbili rainforest that is partly cleared by BioShape to make way for plantations.
The Namateule / Namatimbili tropical forest is best developed in the northern part along the plateau edge and in the south along a river. These parts are undoubtedly cut by BioShape. At the time of writing the EIA EMAC should have known how important nature was sacrified bt BioShape, because there were extensive reports available about the biodiversity of this area. Erik Prince and Philip Clarke described the ornithology of the area in an extensive report in December 2005 and in July 2006 on the vegetation in the area.
See here for the complete report.

Read here what requirements one must meet for an EIA in Tanzania.

BioShape probably got nervous, because after presenting the EIA to NEMC friends were rounded up.
Bioshape organized to make an "Strategic Impact Assessment ' (SIA) arranged by the company AIDEnvironment in Amsterdam. A consultant visited Tanzania for the preparation of this SIA.
The World Wildlife Fund asked AIDEnvironment to consult the SIA requested, but was not allowed because there would be confidential information in the report..
Later on AIDEnvironment came with a statement that the new report was no Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) but a Strategic Impact Assessment (SIA) and for that reason fell outside the disclosure requirements under EU Directive 2003/35/EC8.
One can question the independence or impartiality of this SIA, because one member of the board of directors of AIDEnvironment, and a member of the supervisory board with the BioShape Holding BV, both are a commissioner at the Triodos Bank, so, a link has been established.
The member of the board of AIDEnvironment is also a board member of Oxfam, which had destructive criticism about the degradation of tropical forests in Tanzania by the biofuel industry.

There is another reason for the impartiality of this SIA from AIDEnvironment, that is, Oxfam has written several reports stating that the protected areas in East Africa are affected by biofuel companies like BioShape.
The report ' Biofuels in Africa ", published in May 2008, says literally:

Wetlands are a vital link in the African water cycle. They are a source of life for both people and
nature. Although African wetlands cover only about 4% of its total land mass, they store more
than half the world’s liquid fresh water storage. Many people depend directly on the wetlands.
The fertile soils, the availability of fresh water and fish stocks provide the basis for their
livelihood. African wetlands also host a broad array of species and play an essential role for
migratory birds in Europe and Asia. Despite their importance, inland and coastal wetlands are
being lost faster than any other ecosystem. Large-scale irrigation, drainage and pollution
increasingly take their toll.
The growing global attention for biofuels could increase the pressure on the African wetlands. So
far, Africa has remained at the sideline of the production of biofuel feedstocks, but is more and
more regarded as the ‘global power house’. Africa has a favorable climate, affordable labor and
abundant land resources. This raises the question of how the development of biofuels will affect
African wetland areas and the people living there.

In a second report on biofuels in Africa, ' Biofuels and A2002 Wetlands.pdf " from December 2009, AIDEnvironment writes:

The world market for biofuels has expanded rapidly in recent years. Biofuel production brings both
opportunities and challenges from a sustainability perspective. The quick scan has identified
the following main issues of concern relating to biofuels production impacting wetlands, namely:

* Green House Gas (GHG) emissions;
* Biodiversity loss;
* Bad water and soil management practices;
* Infrastructure development and related environmental and social impacts;
* Land rights, indigenous people's right, labor and human rights;
* Socio-economic development and fair prices;
* Competition with food, feed and local uses;
* Use of marginal and degraded land;
* Indirect Land Use Change (ILUC).

In both reports AIDEnvironment writes about the damage to nature caused by the cultivation of crops to produce biofuels.

The fact that nobody has access to the SIA says it all ....

The authorities in Kilwa headquarters suggested the Forest and Beekeeping Division to review the legal consequences of the concession granted to BioShape Tanzania, including the permit issuance process. The logging and processing of felled tropical hardwood before permits were issued, is a subject of research.
In the middle of 2009 the FBD planned to start an investigation at BioShape Tanzania Ltd., but the retirement of the manager responsible of gathering the information, prevented such an investigation. The FBD staff indicated the investigation should be finished by the end of October 2009, but until now nothing is heard whether the investigation was carried out, probably because of the bankruptcy of the BioShape Holding B.V..

What happened is that the Chief of the Kilwa District produced a statement to the FBD on the illegal logging of tropical hardwood by BioShape Tanzania Ltd.. The Chief of the Kilwa District has confirmed that illegal logging has taken place without the necessary permits and procedures and without any payment to the government. BioShape, according to the Chief of the Kilwa District, paid the appropiate royalties after the illegal logging of tropical hardwood after which the wood had been legalized. Under current rules the Chief of the Kilwa District district had to give BioShape a penalty but this was never realized.

It's not surprisingly to the editors of Fibronot.nl BioShape has been working illegal and perhaps is still going on. In a country where the central government has argued no rules regarding the production of biofuels, where corruption and paying bribes or kickbacks is more rule than exception, you can expect anything. As long as the president of the National Bank of Tanzania builds expensive private homes with large swimming pools and luxurious air-conditioned building for himself and his closest associates at the expense of the bank and it appears during an interrogation by the Parliament that he gets away with it, you can expect everything from companies like BioShape. With members ot the board of BioShape which has been involved in lawsuits, one member of the board who has been involved in several bankruptcies, almost bankruptcies, Chapter 11 and investigations by the Justice department, you can expect everything in a country without rules.

In a hard to beat report the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) expressed serious doubts about the integrity of the EIA made by BioShape. The EIA by BioShape is silent on the extensive forest areas along the coast, the Coastal Forests. The land were BioShape is planning the plantations is described as degraded Miombo Woodlands. Members of the WWF have conducted on-site observations, which revealed the absence of degraded Miombo Woodlands.
The particular area in Kilwa is within the Costal Forests area of biodiversity hot spots and may affect the area threatening endemic species of animals and plants. If a specie occurs only in a certain area, one speaks of an endemic specie.

The Kilwa landscape comprises of mixture of woodland and coastal forest of various types. Much of the coastal forests are ungazzeted as reserves which in turn host a rich diversity of flora and fauna of which a high proportion are endemic species to the coastal forests or even just within the Kilwa ecological landscape.
The planned areas for clearance for biofuel plantations by Bioshape could potentially impact on the biodiversity values of Unchungwa and Nainokwe coastal forests. The forests on the coastal plane are ungazzeted and protected and the Mpingo bird surveys have shown that these areas are rich in coastal forest bird species that are in turn predictive indicators for the likely presence of other coastal forest fauna.

The Mythe of Marginal Land

One of the supposed advantages of the jatropha plant is that it will grow on “marginal land” and so does not compete with food crops. This implies that there are acres of low-quality land available, ready to be cultivated with jatropha or other potential agrofuel feedstocks. But in reality, land is often officially classified as “marginal” because it is not privately owned. It may be communal land, often used for grazing, food crops, and also for collecting medicinal plants, but can also refer to, wetlands, swamps or mountainous terrain61. Because communities rarely hold the land titles to communally used land, it can be difficult to prevent it from being sold.

Raed here the destructive criticism in the WWF report about BioShape.

WWF has a litany of criticisms of the BioShape EIA:

One of the most worrying facts about the report that has come to light is that one of the principle authors, Mr C.M Kayombo, who is a botanists based at the National Herbarium in Tanzania did not write the report and was not aware that he was named as author.

Throughout the document, the area is characterised as 'disturbed Miombo‘. There is no mention of the fact that the project is within the coastal forest biodiversity hotspot and that the project might pose a risk to some of the coastal forest endemic species. Coastal forests are not mentioned anywhere.

There is no detailed description of the methodology used to assess the vegetation and therefore provide a basis for concluding that it is mostly low-value Miombo. It appears that field visits were made to the site but that the main focus for these was on stakeholder consultation. There is no mention of any detailed study of
the vegetation either using ground surveys or remote sensing. Thus all conclusions about the vegetation type found in the area appear to be unsubstantiated., especially when compared to actual satellite images.

No basis is given for concluding that the buffering approach that they propose is suited to the ecology of the area, and no attempt is made to map elephant trails to prevent planting on these.

No scientific references are provided for any the ecological claims made in the reports. The only references listed relate to the various policies and to EIA methodology.
In the EIA BioShape says repeatedly biofuels can reduce CO2 emissions and that this is just a justification for their development of the area.
Also this argument is contested by experts. They concluded that the cultivation of jatropha means a massive increase of CO2 in the atmosphere after the clearing of extensive forest areas.

The impact of 10,000 people moving to such a sensitive area is not addressed by the report. In addition this is an unrealistically large number of people to manage adequately.

In particular the report does not consider the impact that such a population will have on the surrounding environment bearing in mind that labour is likely to be seasonal. In Arusha, they have found that Jatropha only produces seeds when it rains. This means that there will be a peak demand for labour to harvest the
seeds at particular times of the year. For the rest of the year, the workers will either have to find alternative forms of employment or migrate elsewhere. The inevitable additional pressures on the forests from logging and charcoal production are obvious.

The report makes no mention of uncertainties in the biofuel market particularly given the (likely) about-turn in Europe regarding member state's obligation to adopt biofuels.

Overall it seems that 81,000 ha of land are being allocated to an investor for very little money to largely clear its natural vegetation without a logging permit from the District Forest Officer in order to produce a crop whose economic viability is unproven.

There is no analysis in the EIA of the change of the CO2 balance if the existing vegetation is replaced by the jatropha plant.
Apart from the EIA an analysis of the CO2 balance has been made. The cultivation of jatropha would be CO2 neutral, but that statement is wiped out bt all kinds of international organizations and experts from NGO's in Tanzania. The report was supervised by the Chairman of the Supervisory Board of the BioShape Holding B.V. and made by the former employer of the Chairman of the Supervisory Board, CE Delft.

Nowhere in the EIA we read something about the lifecycle of the Kilwa jatropha project. Given the fact the raw jatropha nuts are transported to Europe by ship and large areas with natural vegetation disappear, it is unlikely that this will result in a positive net CO2 result.

The EIA is ambiguous and even contradictory in some parts if the jatropha seeds once in Tanzania will be processed. The EIA claims that one advantage of Kilwa jatropha project is that it will also reduce imports of foreign fossil fuels. This is of course nonsense, because at least during the first five years, the jatropha project will export all the material to the Netherlands and Belgium in order to process it. At various points in the EIA is quoted that Europe is the market for which the biofuel is intended.
Nowhere in the EIA states that BioShape ever undertook action to build a processing plant or power plant in Kilwa.
There is even a significant risk that BioShape will never build a processing plant in Kilwa and will continue to export the raw material for jatropha oil thus undermining these benefits.

A biofuel expert has put the economic feasibility of the plan into question. The plan is only based on some assumptions that are unproven and can not be explored in the EIA.
In late May 2010 even the WWF demonstrated  that jatropha is an economically viable crop. The WWF has conducted this research together with a German government agency, the GTZ.
The GTZ is a government agency and advisory body of the German Federal Government and operates worldwide in the field of international cooperation for sustainable development. Following this report, GTZ advises the German government now to its current biofuels policy re-evaluation and use of jatropha not encouraging. Further the GTZ requests all public and private organizations to no longer growing jatropha and to promote large plantations.

Most data on jatropha mentioned in the EIA by BioShape comes from India.
A PhD student who visited some jatropha plantations in India, said many details in the EIA are doubtful. In India, for example, 5 kg of jatropha seeds produces 1 liter of oil. In Arusha this is only 15% or 0.75 liters.


With the current price of diesel in Dar es Salaam, the jatropha oil production on a plantation may not exceed $ 0.16 per liter to be able to compete with fossil diesel. If the infrastructure costs are included, a producer can not exceed to pay its employees 3 or 4 U.S.$ cents per kilo of jatropha seeds. These figures are similar to what BioShape is paying its employees, which is approximately Tsh 3000 for 80 kg jatropha seeds. However, it is highly unlikely that BioShape will find 10,000 employees who are willing to work for this sparse wage under these conditions for longer times. ¹)

It is uncritically assumed that the Jatropha oil from the Kilwa District is of very good quality what is documented nowhere in the EIA.
The reports by WWF and GTZ are just highlights of the poor yields of jatropha in Kenya and Tanzania. Data on poor harvests which WWF uses come from hundreds of farmers in the two countries.

BioShape's businessplan may be based on another important source of income, namely the sale of felled tropical hardwood. In the EIA BioShape says the sale of the hardwood will help to alleviate the costs of storage and arrangement of the plantations, although it is unclear that the sale of the timber will be capable to set up a potentially economically viable biofuel plantation which will bring some wealth in the Kilwa District and the villages around the plantations.

We're talking about large scale logging. The IMFLEG, in collaboration with local authorities, estimated that in the coming years BioShape Tanzania wil cut between 200,000 m³ and 800,000 m³ of tropical hardwoods to make room for the jatropha plant. The value of the harvested wood is estimated to be between $ 50 million and $ 150 million.

The impact on this ecologically very sensitive area where 10,000 laborers are harvesting is not described in the EIA. Moreover, this is an unrealistically large number of people to manage if you see that BioShape had to do every effort to find some managers who were able to keep in check only 300 labor.
The EIA speaks nowhere on the impact and consequences that 10,000 farm workers will have on the sparsely populated area especially if you consider that work must be done in a very short time during harvest.

In Arusha the jatropha plant growers have noticed jatropha only produces enough seeds when it rains or the plant gets plenty of water and fertilizer. This means there is a surge in demand for workers who will be able to harvest the seeds. For the rest of the year, the workers will have to find alternative employment somewhere else. There will inevitably be a heavy pressure execised by the unemployed on protected forests when illegal timber logging and charcoal making will take place.

Summarizing the WWF report says it appears 81,000 hectares of forest and agricultural land is allocated to an investor who had no cutting permit from the District Forest Officer to make a crop to produce of which the economic feasibility is not proven. ²)

¹) In Tanzania this website fibronot.nl enjoys also some interest. A reader in Dar es Salaam wrote in an e-mail to the editors of fibronot.nl, there are many (ex) employees whose wages were not paid. Also there is submitted a large number of complaints from former employees at the Regional Commissioner for Mediation and Arbitration complaining about the lack of payment of outstanding wages. All complaints are centrally collected by the Tanzanian Union of Industrial and Commercial Workers (TUICO) and submitted to the Commission for Conciliation and Arbitration of Labor. TheTUICO union is considering a lawsuit against BioShape.

²) Since the WWF report it appeared BioShape paid a fine for illegal logging.

The full WWF report on the biofuels industry in Tanzania can be read here.

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The World Wildlife Fund in Sweden made a report in which an interesting part about BioShape is written. The report called: Jakten på biobränslen - hot eller hopp för Östafrika? Translated: The quest for biofuels, threat or hope for East Africa?

From the report:

In 2001 researchers discovered a pristine coastal rainforest Namateule / Namatimbili in Tanzania by means of satellite images. Danish researchers have explored and mapped the area in 2002. The approximately 10,000-acre rain forest is part of a large stretch of coastal forests of 60,000 hectares. Namateule / Namatimbili is the largest contiguous rainforest along the east coast of Tanzania. The Namateule / Namatimbili rainforest is just sandwiched between two large plantations where BioShape wants to cultivate large scale jatropha. The northern part of the Namateule / Namatimbili rainforest, an estimated 1000 hectares, is used by BioShape to establish plantations.
BioShape stated that they do not intend to cut trees in the rainforest, but only want to cut trees that are affected. Apart from the fact that BioShape has nothing to do in this rainforest, the affected areas of rainorest play a major role as dispersion area of wild animals. Also found here are many paths of wild animals.
Dispersion is the spreading of young animals. These young animals roam after they became independent.
It is ridiculous that a stranger from the Netherlands say that affected areas of forest will be cut here.

After the release of theWWF and IMFLEG reports it seems BioShape adjusted the boundaries of his concessions so it seems if less wood is harvested. Given the huge piles of tropical hardwood in Kilwa District and in Arusha near Artif it seems that no less is harvested.

WWF quotes an e-mail from Mr Hermans, in which he suggests that his company does not appear to be aware of the nature and composition of the area, despite the submitted Environmental Impact Assessment:

"... Is it really coastal rain forest in our area? I want to know. We will protect it. We will not protect the area that we need to grow ..."

When BioShape started in Tanzania the company made a small report where Site Selection Criteria are described. Mr Herman wrote the following in the Site Selection Criteria on protecting individual trees:
* Preserve all Ebony (Mpingo) trees and Baobab and other remarkable trees which are to be
considered very crucial to the landscape due to their size, age or species.
What do we read on the Artif website, the Arusha based company that sells the tropical hardwood which is harvested by BioShape?

Woods: Dalbergia melanoxylon or Mpingo .
You can book your exclusive furniture made of wood from the protected Mpingo Artif to buy wood that in its Site Selection Criteria Hermans wrote about: Preserve all Ebony (Mpingo) trees.
The editors of Fibronot.nl think this report is made for the media to show how BioShape loves nature.

The following excerpt from the Daily News Tanzania on December 31, 2009 speaks clearly:

Researchers warned that BioShape has cleared huge contracts of land threatening water sources and conservation areas.

According to Dr. Mkindi BioShape Tanzania Ltd. was, by mid-December 2009 the employer of 600 people who earned less than $ 2 a day. BioShape Tanzania Ltd. promised verbally the company will invest in social infrastructure such as roads, schools and water sources.
Does this a promise mean an excuse for the damage BioShape Tanzania caused?

A study by three leading institutes of the Technical University of Dar es Salaam led by Professor Burton Mwamila and funded by the Swedish International Development Agency, shows the cultivation of crops for biofuels, such as jatropha, caused major damage to the environment. Existing roads and water resources are sacrificed to the greed.
Original natural vegetation, such as the Miombo Woodlands, coastal forests, wetlands and other wetland forests are the real victims of jatropha of which BioShape wants to export the seeds to the Netherlands and Belgium so much.

The Miombo Woodlands belong to the WWF Global 200 List . The Global 200 is a list of protected areas proposed by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF).
According to WWF, these protected aresa are the 200 (now 237) of our planet's most endangered natural areas, which are rare because of their rich biodiversity and natural systems. Such list includes also the 50 most endangered freshwater areas.
At spot 8 on the Global 200 are the East African Forests Coastal, on spot 87 are the East African Acacia savannas and on spot 88 are the Central and Eastern Miombo Woodlands. Each of them are areas where BioShape plans the plantations. BioShape likes acacia wood as we can see on the Artif website.

The decrease of surface of the Miombo Woodlands since 1990 has been great.
The following table shows the reduction:


(Click to enlarge)

The Miomba Woodlands are plundered by BioShape Ltd. Tanzania.

Is cultivation of jatropha CO2-neutral?

Experts in Tanzania, but in fact from a lot of international organisations all over the world agree and are showing a growing concern that deforestation is causing an increase in CO2 in the atmosphere. Trees store CO2 and convert a portion of the stored CO2 into oxygen.
Oxfam, one of the largest organizations for International Development, writes the production of biofuels require massive land surfaces, leading to destruction of marshes, wetlands and forests that would normally absorb huge amounts of CO2. The production of biofuels will lead to more CO2 rather than less. Oxfam says there is a lot simpler, cheaper and secure ways to fight climate change and oil dependency reduction than by focusing on biofuels.

While rich countries do their best to reache their biofuel production targets, the rights of poor people are trampled. Often poor people are relocated by means of force or they get no access to their land any more which is essential to meet their needs. When people lose their land, they lose their livelihood, pushing them even deeper into poverty and that is exactly what is happening today currently in the Kilwa District, where Bioshape was an active player.

We're talking about pretty large CO2 storage in the above areas. In the Miombo Woodlands of Tanzania about 87 tonnes of CO2 are saved per hectare. In less developed Miombo Woodlands, the amount of CO2 saved is approximately 33 tonnes per hectare.

See the table below on storage of CO2.
In the table below we don't see the amout of CO2 storage which is saved in tropical rainforests. Tropical rainforests store between 500 and 900 tonnes of CO2 per hectare.

If the use of land with high carbon stocks in soil or vegetation changes on the production of biofuels or biomass, usually a portion of the stored carbon is released into the atmosphere, leading to the formation of carbon dioxide. The resulting negative impact on greenhouse gas, will surpass the positive impact of biofuels on greenhouse gas or biomass even largely. When calculating the greenhouse emission reduction of certain biofuels and biomass one should take into account the full impact of such changes in land use. This is necessary to ensure the calculation of greenhouse emission reduction takes into account the total carbon impact of biofuels and biomass.

Land use can not be converted for biofuel production if the carbon stocks arising from the conversion within a reasonable time may be offset by the greenhouse gas emission reductions resulting from the production of biofuels and biomass. This would avoid unnecessarily laborious research by market, and to prevent countries like Tanzania with high carbon stocks, which in retrospect were not suitable for the production of biomass feedstocks and biofuels, yet are intended for that purpose.

By inventory of global carbon stocks can be concluded wetlands and continuously forested areas such as the Miombo Woodlands in Tanzania with a coverage rate of more than 30% in this category should be included. Wooded areas with a coverage rate between 10% and 30% should also be included, unless it is shown that their carbon stocks are low enough to justify their conversion. Even the degraded Miombo Woodlands fall in the range of 10% to 30% because they have a significant amount of CO2 saved.
Agricultural crops are used to produce biofuels. Biofuels are therefore competing with food, especially if in future we have to refuel 'green' more often. In addition, the quality of agricultural development in many countries over the coming decades are going to deteriorate, due to depletion of soil salinization and erosion.

Most forests in Tanzania consists of protected reserves or are on lists of the United Nations and the World Wildlife Fund with the intention of getting a protected status. Clearing of these forests is a crime against humanity. The huge piles of hardwood seen at the BioShape sawmill in Mavuji show BioShape certainly is not contributing to a lower CO2 content in the atmosphere. The cultivation of jatropha is CO2 neutral, as BioShape says. The people who made the report for BioShape are telling fairy tales, under the guise of sustainability, fairy tales which they believe themselves. People who apparently have some self-interest in matters other than reality suggests.

A study in Science shows that cultivation of biomass means extra CO2 emissions. When cutting down one hectare of forest between 500 and 900 tonnes of CO2 emits. By processing one hectare of palm oil into biodiesel, approximately six tonnes of fossil CO2 emissions are saved per year. This means it takes 80 to 150 years before the emitted CO2 will be recoverd. However, if the forest soil is moor the amount of CO2 released in the atmosphere is much higher and the payback period is considerably longer. The study in Science also shows that biofuels have limited effectiveness in CO2 savings. The use of biofuels is not as efficient in terms of CO2 reduction. The conversion of tropical forest to agricultural land in a period of thirty years, gives more CO2 emissions than any other land use change.
There is no single biofuel of which the use over a period of thirty years constitutes sufficient CO2 reduction to compensate the conversion of tropical forests to agricultural land.

Only in a period of 100 years or more we are able to determ whether the CO2 balance is in equilibrium. At this moment and over the next ten decades the CO2 balance in the cultivation of jatropha is highly unbalanced and definitely not CO2 neutral as BioShape claims.

The English magazine The Guardian wrote an article on February 15, 2010, titled:

EU biofuels rules significantly harming food production in developing countries
EU biofuels 10% targets cause millions of peope to go hungry and increase food prices and landlessness

The journalist from Tanzania among others writes the following and gives verbal counteract to the EU: Biofuels are not the answer to climate change.
Most biofuels are worse than fossil fuels they are supposed to replace. Large-scale plantations for biofuels increase carbon dioxide emissions, either directly by cutting down forests or plowing of other carbon-rich habitats, or indirectly by forcing farmers to move to these areas.

Given the official position of the EU announcement on June 10, 2010 (in Dutch language) the swelling international criticism of the cultivation of crops for biofuels hit the right note.

The world's forests contain an estimated amount of 500 billion tons of carbon, while mankind 'only' emits 7 billion tons of fossil carbon in the form of CO2 emissions each year, resulting from the combustion of coal, oil and natural gas. New, fast growing forest which gets back CO2 from the atmosphere, exist as a potential
effective remedy for the greenhouse effect and global warming. It 'catches' CO2 and converts it into wood and biomass. The changing of existing forest to farmland in South America, East Africa and Southeast Asia currently accounts for 20 percent of total CO2 emissions by humans - more than the CO2 uptake by reforestation in the rest of the world.
It is clear that no more deforestation of rain forests and jungles for agriculture or livestock for the most part contributes to lower CO2 emissions in the world.

It is important to scrutinize closely the impact of the cultivation of biomass, such as changes in land use, including displacement effects, the introduction of invasive alien species and other impacts on biodiversity and impact on food production and local wealth.
Considering the non-tender criticism from various international organizations, local nature conservation organizations and government agencies recently in Tanzania on the way BioShape Tanzania works, it seems that given the lack of adequate supervision BioShape could simply goes its own way and seems to ignore the variety of reports in which the company is quoted negative.

Only during the last couple of years organizations for nature protection in Tanzania seem to notice any harm to ancient forests mainly caused by human activities, not least by planting jatropha on a large scale.
The African Wildlife Foundation in cooperation with the Embassy of Norway in Tanzania started a project to to save the centuries-old forests of Kolo in the Kondoa District from destruction.The Norwegian government supports the project with a donation of over $ 2 million.
Kolo's forests are famous for their prehistoric paintings in caves which showed evidence of occupation by the first settlers in Africa.
Not only the above mentioned institutions and organizations express their distrust and concerns about growing jatropha.
From the BioShape company we recently heard gloomy sounds, especially if you read between the lines.
Mrs Ina de Visser, manager Sustainability at BioShape in Tanzania wrote the following about the sluggishness of biomass:

Biomass left behind

In 2005 and 2006 one began to invest in the cultivation of biomass (solid and liquid biofuels, wood, palm oil, jatropha) on a large scale. The oil price was high and the EU came with regulations which said the consumption of green fuels was mandatory. Several countries came with subsidies which were needed to stimulate consumption. Biomass was seen as a sustainable solution.
How different the situation is now. Crude oil futures dropped and hence the ambitions of the EU. There were questions about the real sustainability of some biofuels like palm oil. The more or less artificial biomass market collapsed. The investments made in those years didn't pay out yet with to the risk the investments are depreciated and the widespread availability of biofuels is delayed, and hence availability at a competitive price.
Although there is a discussion possible about the sustainability of some types of biofuels, it is a means of reducing greenhouse gas emissions at relatively short notice, towards even better alternatives like solar energy. It is unfortunate this is delayed by financial malaise, because the investment in other alternatives are also lagging behind.

Mrs de Visser should know that the cultivation of jatropha is not sustainable and certainly not contribution to a reduction of the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere.

In tradition with the biomass sector new companies or foundations are established. In 2007 the BioShape Benefits Foundation was established. The BBF is mainly financed by the BioShape Holding. The BBF will initiate and promote development in those regions where raw materials for biofuels are grown.
The foundation of the BBF was more or less a condition of the Tanzanian government. BioShape Tanzania had, as a consideration for the consent to grow jatropa on approximately 80,000 hectares, invest in health and education in Kilwa District. One of the aims is to improve obstetric care.
The conditions the Tanzanian government set to BioShape are seen in a different light when reading a local newspaper, The Citizen in Dar es Salaam. Approximately one year after the establishment of BioShape in Tanzania in July 2008, the newspaper wrote an article in which members of the Tanzanian Parliament, criticized the events surrounding BioShape. Read this article from The Citizen.
In another article , The Citizen on July 24, 2008 also was critical in respect to the biofuel vultures and their threat to tropical forests and fertile agricultural land in Tanzania.

Secondly carpentry Artif was established. The Arusha Timber Factory is based in Arusha in northern Tanzania. Artif makes exclusive furniture made of tropical hardwood. The wood for these exclusive furniture is provided by BioShape Tanzania in the south of Tanzania. BioShape has established a large sawmill in Mavuji. This sawmill is by far the biggest sawmill in Southern Tanzania.
The Executive Board of Artif is Cor Vaes' daughter, together with her British boyfriend.

Artif sells luxury (garden) furniture which is made of all kinds of tropical hardwoods, including the endangered and protected species like Dalbergia Melanoxylon or Mpingo, also called African Black Ebony. The tree is also known as Grenadil. The wood yields € 18,000 per m³ and expensive musical instruments as oboes and clarinets are made of Mpingo. The wood is popular for its beautiful clean tone on the instruments, but Artif makes exclusive furniture. According to CITES , the international convention which limits the trade in endangered animals and plants, specifies Grenadil to the endangered species. That is, the tree can completely disappear in a generation or two if nothing is done.
Since July 1th 2004 there is a ban on the export of illegally harvested tropical hardwoods.
The Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism has banned mainly because illigaly felled hardwood in the Kilwa and Lindi regions was exported. Unfortunately in practice is seen there are shiploads of illegally logged timber to disappear overseas. Corruption in the various ports of Tanzania bloom luxuriantly.

The furniture Artif made of protected tropical hardwood will be sold at a company called KN Light, part of the BioOne Group at the famous address to the Napoleonsweg sold 116a in Neer. Undoubtedly with a substantial profit and of course without the FSC logo.

Ban on illegally logged tropical hardwoods?

In 2003, the Dutch Tweede kamer adopted a motion that bans the import of illegal tropical timber. Unfortunately this pushes this politically sensitive issue to 'Europe'. From experience we know the mills in Brussels are running hardly. Not until December 15, 2009 the EU Agriculture Council concludes a very weak political agreement on the bill to stop the trade in illegally logged timber. Minister Verburg has negotiated on behalf of the Netherlands for strong legislation with a European ban on trade in illegal timber, but to no avail.
EU agriculture ministers in Brussels came with an agreement on a weak and inadequate legislation against the criminal trade in illegal timber. It is not explicitly prohibited to trade in illegally logged timber and no minimum fines and penalties were established. Also not all firms in the wood chain have to comply with legislation. These loopholes are good news for traders of illegally harvested timber.

The credibility of the EU within the climate negotiations is at stake. Member States do not even seriously tackle the criminal trade in illegal timber, while causing large-scale deforestation and increases the greenhouse effect. It is important the Netherlands holds its leading position next year during the second round of negotiations and inherits more countries to ban the trade in illegally harvested timber.
Since 2003, the European Commission is working on an action plan (FLEGT, Forest Law Enforcement Governance and Trade) to combat illegal logging. Legislation is one of the measures. In March 2009, the European Parliament improved the bill made by the European Commission. By decision of December 15, 2009 the Agriculture Council ignored the European Parliament completly. Fortunately there is last opportunity because the last step is the the hope that the European Parliament and the Council of Agriculture will agree. If successful, the bill will be ready in the summer of 2010.

In this way BioShape Tanzania and subsidiary Artif continue to trade in protected tropical hardwood timber, under the guise of, we plant new trees, do we?

Where do you draw the line?
How far can you go?

The World Wildlife Fund, the Independent Monitor of Forest Law Enforcement and Governance in Tanzania (IMFLEG) and Prince Engineering in Denmark fixed land border markers on the fields of the BioShape concessions on the basis of satellite images from Landsat satellites. The editors of Fibronot.nl used to draw some borders on Google maps using these coordinates found on the Internet. On all maps the same borders to the north of the Namateule / Namatimbili rainforest were drawn.

On the map below we see some areas near the town Mavuji where BioShape Tanzania has reserved land for plantations, outlined in purple. The northern part of the plantation is the famous Namateule / Namatimbili rainforest.


(Click to enlarge)

According to the Cramer Criteria companies such as BioShapeTanzania should meet the following requirements: Plantations may not be situated in or in the immediate vicinity of 'gazetted protected areas' (government protected areas) or areas of High Conservation Value'.
The above map clearly shows the plantations of BioShape in close proximity to four of the largest forest reserves which are held as HCVF Type 1. These forests are the Namateule / Namatimbili tropical rain forest of 10,000 hectares, the 60,484 hectares Mitaurure Forest Reserve, the 2070 hectares Ngarama Forest Reserve and the 8547 hectares Mitundumbea Forest Reserve.
Especially the BioShape concessions to the north and the east of Namateule / Namatimbili rainforest are raising questions, because here BioShape cut a piece of tropical forest in the size of 70 acres for a trial plot. These 70 ha ' trial plot "is part of a field of over 1000 hectares for the most part in Namateule / Namatimbili rainforest. The editors of Fibronot measured the coordinates of the landmarks that Prince Engineering in the field and entered the coordinates on Google Maps. It appears that the northern area of Namateule / Namatimbili is cut by the border of the Bioshape plantation. See the Google Maps below.


(Click to enlarge)

Despite the promise of BioShape that felled forest will be replanted elsewhere, there is nothing to see on recent satellite images. The SPOT 5 satellite for example made crystal clear close-up view of the Bioshape concessions and sawmill in Mavuji on May 14, 2009
Also remarkable are satellite images from 2007 where one can see some great bush fires inside the Bioshape concession. Click on the map below for an overview. The fires were located in the northern part of the BioShape area.


(Click to enlarge)

It's striking that in one of the least densely populated areas in Tanzania these big bushfires originate. It is known that poachers often start a bushfire but that's not what the editors of Fibronot.nl think this time. The fires seem to be deliberately lit with the aim to 'clear' grass and woodland very quickly.

In the village Mavuji, shown above on the right side we see the BioShape base camp with sawmill and warehouses.
Construction activity in satellite images is shown:


Left an image of Google Earth in 2006, the right side shows a Spot-5 image from May 2009

Prins Engineering, an internationally recognized aerial mapping company operating from Denmark measured the coordinates at the Bioshape concession in the northern part of Namateule / Namatimbili forest and completed the landmarks on a Landsat satellite image. The map clearly shows the southern boarder of the Bioshape concession which is running across the northern part of the Namateule / Namatimbili rain forest:


Both BioShape plantations, with yellow lines circled around the Namateule / Namatimbili rainforest
(Click to enlarge)

Internationally recognized organizations and companies independently fixed northern border of the BioShape concessions.
What does BioShape do when it appears that a large part of the concession runs through the northern part of the Namateule / namatimbili rainforest? Bioshape sends some students of the Copernicus Institute, part of the Utrecht University to Tanzania, Bioshape gives them a map from Landsat and after an extensive survey the students exactly know where the boundaries should be drawn.
It is not surprising that this new boundary lines, unlike all other cards, now lie almost entirely outside the Namateule / Namatimbili rainforest. The card below shows clearly the difference:


The new boarders according BioShape


Again the northern boundary of the Bioshape concession as seen on April 23, 2009

It's remarkable BioShape is always ready to respond to reports made by others. Reports from renowned institutions are always wrong or are not correct.
It appears BioShape, after devastating comment from the World Wildlife Fund on the content of the EIA, made a new SIA rapidly. A SIA so top secret nobody can see him.
Once the boundaries of the various BioShape concessions were established by foreign institution, Bioshape suddenly shows up with a map of the Copernicus Institute on April 23, 2009.

Did the boundary of the plantation suddenly attained the status of scientific because "Utrecht" backs it? There are as yet very few people who believe these are the final borders and that the maps only serve for PR purposes.
It's no coincidence the biggest investor in the BioShape Holding, Eneco Energy, left in the beginning of 2009.
It's no coincidence that all activities in Tanzania BioShape are suspended..
It's no coincidence that (former) employees didn't receive their wages.
It's no coincidence that all employees of all BioShape organisations, where ever they may be, are not allowed to speak with journalists
It's no coincidence the Bioshape Holding was declared bankrupt.

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Firsthand

An Australian charity grants a lot of aid to villagers in the area of the BioShape plantations near Mavuji. An employee of ActionAid International Tanzania, Albert Jimwaga, who's born in the region, nows exactly how the villagers feel, what disaster occurs in the district and how desperate the local population of Mavuji is. He has many years experience as representative of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in Tanzania. UNDP is the largest charity in the world. Past eighteen months he was employed by ActionAid International.

ActionAid International provides assistance to residents, gives schools access to modern means such as computer training, furnish schools, provides for the care of orphans and provide education for those children. ActionAid International also provides assistance to hospitals.
Without fuss on a website, simply short and essentially what the organization does without the sticky stuff with politicians and other officials or private telephone number of the women of the President of Tanzania who can always be called, as we can read on the website of the Bioshape Benefits Foundation.
ActionAid International's annual report sounds like a clock. Rightly so, each year an annual report.
Take for example a Dutch organization SVVT, the Friends of Tanzania, which is doing good work near Arusha among the population. SVVT published a detailed financial report with detailed financial statements since the creation of SVVT, 10 year ago where each Euro spent is justified. What gets in and to whom and where the money is spent. From books for the schools to the uniforms of nurses.
This contrasts with the Bioshape Benefits Foundation, where there is too much emphasis on contact with dignitaries, perhaps in an attempt to appease them for the activities of BioShape Tanzania Ltd..

Below we can read the news first hand, from an inhabitant of the region who knows the habits and lifestyles of the villagers. Albert Jimwaga expresses in a clear manner the conditions of the local population which is starving for food and holds the biofuel industry responsible for the severe food shortages and increasing poverty in these poorest region of Tanzania.

On March 19, 2010 Albert Jimwaga wrote an article on the site of ActionAid International about a resident of Mavuji. The piece drew on April 7, 2010 the article drew the attentione of the editors of Fibronot.nl . The person is Asha Bakari (age 36), a resident of Mavuji, the nerve center of the Bioshape operations.
The article, which is nothing but a big cry for help, shows the despair of Bakari.

Biofuels: a catastrophe for poor farmers in Tanzania
March 19, 2010 by Albert Jimwaga
“We are desperate of food. Nowdays food comes from the city to be sold in the village and not vice versa as before. We could not afford to buy food because the wages we are paid was very little. We do not produce our own food as before because our land has been taken over by foreign  companies under privitasation policy  to produce biofuel farms. Everybody is talking of hunger as a consequence of mabadiliko ya hali ya hewa (climate change) but for me our reason is that we are farming in unproductive lands. Increased biofuel production has resulted in massive deforestation and has severe implications for our food security, as energy crops replace our normal land uses. Please tell the government we do not like this behavior of biofuel farms.”
Asha Bakari (36) from Mavuji village in Kilwa district.


Forests cleared for biofuels

The complete article is an indictment of the bureaucracy and corruption especially among Tanzanian government officials and local administrators, who are, not coincidentally, the best friends of the director of the Bioshape Benefits Foundation, if you read her stories on the BBF website.
Apparently these managers do find it the most natural thing in the world that arable land is expropriated from residents for the cultivation of a highly toxic nut.
The fact Asha Bakari in Mavuji mentions his name so openly shows the desperation of those who actually have nothing to lose.
The fact Asha Bakari in Mavuji mentions his name so openly is noteworthy because several statements of (former) employees of Bioshape Tanzania Ltd. shows that these people certainly do not want to mention their names because they fear for their lifes or the lifes of their families.
Until now, only lawyers from Tanzania and representatives of international organizations were mentioned by name when they decribed the abuses around Bioshape Tanzania Ltd..

ActionAid has published some alarming reports over land grabbing by biofuel companies, including: meals_per_gallon_final.pdf

What does a mother, Elisa Alimone Mongue, also farmer in Mozambique, the neighboring country of Tanzania, said? Her land was occupied by a biofuel company.
“I don’t have a farm, I don’t have a garden, because the only land that I have has been destroyed.”

The influence on food prices when cultivation of crops is used for biofuel production , becomes clear when we compare the price of corn between 2007 and 2009.
In November 2009 the prices of maize in Zambia, Kenya, Malawi and Mozambique were 60% higher than in early 2007. In Tanzania, in November 2009 the price of maize was even 150% higher than in January 2007.
Stealing Village Land through fraud and corruption for the production of crops is an attack on the agricultural land that is unparalleled in history.
Like Mozambique, in Tanzania former owners of a piece of Village Land in the Kilwa District are uniting to joint legal action against Bioshape. They do it with help from lawyers who are not guided by self-interested fraud and corruption, but have an eye for the disaster which reveals in the Kilwa District. One doesn't hear the board of BioShape about this humanitarian catastrophe. They are to busy denying they do not cut tropical wood, they didnt know about the fraud with the EIA. The board until now has not denied the fraud and corruption in order to obtain Village Land. That will be difficult given the statements by some politicians and officials to reporters.


In 2008 a resident of Zambia bought the amount of food on the left photo for 1 US dollar,
In 2009 he bought the same amount of food we see on the right side, also for 1 US Dollar.
In Tanzania, one can make the same comparison.

A few years ago, the management of the Bioshape Holding B.V. praised the support among the local population of the Kilwa District of the jatropha project.
There seems nothing left from that context, seen the news about the disastrous developments in Kilwa District, where the Bioshape plantations are situated.

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Valuable tropical forests

All the forests on this world contain special features for the environment, such as the presence and protection of individual animals, trees and plants, the presence and protection of particular water bodies or archaeological sites. Where these values are considered of special importance, the forest can be defined as High Conservation Value Forest (HCVF) .

Below is a picture of the Namateule / Namatimbili Plateau where several Bioshape plantations are situated. According the Cramer criteria this is not allowed.


(Click to enlarge)


Namateule / Namatimbili tropical rainforest

BioShape is logging the tropical hardwood from the plantations of which the company is planning to cultivate jatropha on. Some species of trees are on a list of protected trees from the FAO, the World Food and Agriculture Organization of the UN.
BioShape is also logging the tropical hardwood from Miombo Woodlands which are made suitable for the cultivation of jatropha. In 2008 BioShape started a so-called trial plot of approximately 70 hectares. Members of a local tribe informed the Forest and Beekeeping Division (FBD) BioShape in first instance illegally felled the tropical hardwood. According to a statement from the WWF BioShape was fined by local authorities with an amount of $ 17,000 for the illegal felling of more than 200 m³ of hardwood on the trial plot.
Bioshape also has illegally felled tropical hardwood and fruit trees outside the trial plot BioShape Tanzania. A research into is ongoing. In any case, it is known that BioShape has felled trees outside the trial where a group of elephants regulary came for eating fruits. Native workers in Tanzania BioShape feared these elephants. The company chose the easiest path for them, felling the trees.

A BioShape plantation in Kilwa District. The trees in the picture below
were logged from this former part of tropical forest.

'Legalised' hardwood near the Bioshape sawmill in Mavuji.

The nerve center is located in Bioshape Mavuji. Here are mills, dryers,
farms, warehouses and service centers.



According to a report, composed by TRAFFIC, The Wildlife Trade Monitoring Network, in cooperation with the Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism in Tanzania, the legalization of more than 90% of illegally logged tropical hardwoods is established by fraud. With what one calls 'rubber stamping' official documents are issued for illegally harvested timber, after which it comes on the market legally. In this country without rules and without doubt with some bribes, and wham, here goes another 40 cubic meters of timber to the sawmill.


Inside the Bioshape sawmill
Do you want to see how the sawmill of the Bioshape WoodMizer in real life works?


Another view inside the BioShape sawmill
For cultivation of jatropha you need these kind of heavy machines. BioShape
has by far the largest sawmill in southern Tanzania


Of thick hardwood one is cutting shelfs.....
(Click to enlarge)


....the shelfs are transported to Artif and other customers


The Artif timberfactory in Arusha
(Click to enlarge)


Inside Artif


A stock of tropical hardwood coming from Bioshape in the Kilwa district where the company has
has logged more than 10,000 m³
(Click to enlarge)


A stock of tropical hardwood flooring strips in one of the Bioshape barns
(Hardwood flooring is a product of jatropha ....)

Who sees the huge piles of tropical hardwood throughout Tanzania it's difficult to maintain this wood is harvested to make room for the cultivation of jatropha. It seems the cultivation of jatropha, of which all natural and environmental organizations say "don't do it" has become a side issue and Bioshape is focusing on the You cannot find another biofuel company like Bioshape in Tanzania find which cuts hardwood on a large scale like this to make room for jatropha plantations. It is incomprehensible nature and environmental organizations in the Netherlands does not stand firm against this piracy.
It's time politicians of various political organisations ask questions in the Parliament, because this has absolutely nothing to do with sustainability. The villagers in the Kilwa District will be the victims.

LOST THERE, FELT HERE

An alarming story about the deforestation in Tanzania is written in a report by Conservation International, a nonprofit organization with headquarters in Washington. The newspaper thecitizen.com in Tanzania spent at an article on Saturday, May 15, 2010.
Conservation International has estimated that each year in Tanzania, 2300 km ² of tropical forest is disappeared by (illegal) logging, forest fires and the construction of agricultural land, etc..
The Dutch company Bioshape continue to cut down thousands of cubic meters of tropical hardwood. This is a a serious matter and should be stopped as soon as possible.

"The production of energy crops will have a direct and indirect effect on natural areas (...), this results in substantial emissions of greenhouse gases."

The above comment comes from a report compiled by the Wageningen University and Research Center, the Planning Office for the Environment, the ECN and Ecofys: Can biofuels be sustainable by 2020?

The Foundation for Nature and Environment 2009 wrote a report in 2009: " The hidden climate impact of biofuels . (In Dutch language)

From this report:

Bioenergy is inefficient

"Scientists, civil society organisations and politicians doubt increasingly the sustainability of many types of biomass. Reducing CO2 emissions from biofuels is proving very complex. This has everything to do with the factor of which bioenergy distincts from all other renewable energy sources , namely land use.
Approximately 20% of the current increase of CO2 in the atmosphere is caused by deforestation for agriculture and cattle breeding. Also for the cultivation of energy crops much land is needed. This has important implications for the net climate benefits of biofuels policies.

About the deforestation in developing countries is extensively written. The jatrophaplant is not addressed in the report, but it is clear that given the tens of thousands of cubic meters tropical hardwoods harvested by BioShape, the cultivation of jatropha in no way contributed to a reduction of CO2 in the atmosphere.


BioShape plantation near Mavuji


Visitors at the BioShape plantation


Sawn hardwood of the BioShape plantations drying in large containers


Remember, three years ago this field was still full of giant tropical trees when it still was a
tropical forest.


An example where tropical forest can still be seen on the background , has been cut to use the
fertile land to be used for growing jatropha.The roots of the felled trees
stabbing still above the fertile top layer.

According to some self proclaimed experts jatropha should grow excellent with very little water on poor soil.
There is almost no plantation to find where signs of water are missing. Not only on the
BioShape plantations, but also seen on the above image, which is taken just across the border of
Kenya is clearly to see that giving water around the bushes
is essential and a has high priority.
Also on this spot in Kenya a piece of tropical forests is sacrificed to jatropha. The former fertile
upper layer of the tropical forest is used as a breeding ground
for the jatropha. Nevertheless, the yield of seeds per hectare is striking
small, despite the addition of large amounts of water, fertilizer and pesticides.

Except water from rivers also widely scarce water is extracted from the soil
extracted.
BioShape Tanzania Ltd. commissioned the company which was drilling the wells
first to investigate. The company searched for water in and around the Bioshape plantations at 36 locations.
At 14 sites water was found in reasonable quantities.
The wells are between 30 and 150 meters deep now.


BioShape jatropha nursery with 50,000 plants
(Click to enlarge)



Bioshape Caterpillar for harvesting trees, with mister president in higher spheres


Bioshape Caterpillar for lifting the felled trees


Bioshape Caterpillar to equalize the soil

Let's see how crushing of African jungle works. Check here to see how a plantation is
carved into the jungle.
The roots of the felled trees flying aroud.
Here the floor around the sawmill is also changed. One needs this kind of machines
to lift trees of about 4 tons.


Land clearing often starts without a valid EIA, just put the bulldozer in front of a forest ...
(Click to enlarge)


Goodbye trees, goodbye animals


Gone are the forest, gone also the Mpingo


Goodbye forest, goodbye elephant tracks


Some local people near Kilwa and Lindi are no sweeties too.
With ease, the only two hills in the world where the almost extinct Tessmannia densiflora grows,
was put on fire.


If you see the Bioshape timber storage, one wouldn't think BioShape's main activity is
jatropha. It seems the emphasis is on logging tropical hardwoods as fast and as much
as possible. It's sheer robbery and has nothing to do with biofuels.
(Click to enlarge)

Apart from the plantations in Mavuji BioShape Tanzania begins somewhere around June 2008 with the establishment of plantations in the village Migeregere, about 55 km north of Mavuji. Given the fact that during the whole day two tractors with trailers are driving to the sawmill in Mavuji, fully loaded trailers with tropical timber, one be feared that Bioshape has running the sawmachines at full speed in Migeregere in order to provide adequate supply of fresh wood to the sawmill.

It's is hoped the eyes of the international community will open in time to stop the poaching by companies like BioShape Tanzania Ltd.., SEKAB AB, Sun Biofuels Plc. and BioMassive AB.

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Illegal activities

Several international newspapers wrote about the illegal BioShape activities in the Kilwa District. Even in March and April 2011 they were still interested in what BioShape was doing in Tanzania.
Read the complete article below.

Biofuel project stalls as foreign investors go into bankruptcy

Wednesday, March 30 2011

An ambitious project to produce clean energy for the Netherlands and Belgium has degenerated into a controversial abuse of natural resources in Africa. Bioshape, a clean energy company based in Neer, the Netherlands, is going through bankruptcy proceedings after spending $9.6 million on a failed biofuel project in Tanzania. In 2006, the company agreed to lease 80,000 hectares of coastal woodland in the southern district of Kilwa to grow jatropha, a shrub whose seeds contain an oil that can be processed into green fuel.

Bioshape planned to employ thousands of local farmers and export seeds from Tanzania to the Netherlands, where they would be processed to produce electricity, heat and biodiesel.

Jatropha is one of the preferred feedstocks for fuel produced from plant material. Commonly called biofuel – agrofuel to its critics — such fuel is supposed to be less polluting than traditional fossil fuels.

BioShape invested 25 million euros in a facility intended to process 45,000 tonnes of vegetable oil per annum, and generate 25 megawatt hours, enough to power 50,000 households. The plant in Lommel was just one component of an ambitious network of refineries and co-generation plants that Bioshape planned to build across Belgium and the Netherlands.

The project was backed by big investors such as the Dutch merchant bank Kempen & Co and the utility Eneco.

Go wrong

“Bioshape managed to acquire land through the complicity of local authorities which breached the rules on land lease,” said Stanislaus Nyembea, expert at the organisation Lawyer Environmental Action Network.

Mr Nyembea says villagers relied on their plots to grow food, mainly maize and fruit, as well as for firewood. They agreed to give their land away with the expectation of receiving fair financial compensation based on the value of the allocated land.

According to Tanzanian law, only the central government can lease a parcel of land larger than 200 hectares directly to foreign investors. So ownership of the land in Kilwa was first transferred to the central government, then the Tanzanian Investment Centre authorised the lease to Bioshape.

“We have found out that villages were not properly informed about the terms of the law,” Mr Nyembea explains. “They didn’t know that they would definitively lose ownership of the land allocated to Bioshape. They naively thought that they would get it back at the end of the lease period that usually lasts 99 years.”

Worse, only 40 per cent of the compensation paid by Bioshape went to farmers.

“The rest went to the District Office which had persuaded local villages to sign up to the deal. The District Office has the power to approve the transfer of land from the village level to the district level, before it is eventually transferred to the state level, but has no legal right to receive a share of the money.”

Wilfried Hermans, Bioshape CEO, replies: “Out of the total concession of 81,000 hectares approved by the Tanzanian Investment Centre, we only acquired an initial 34,000 hectares for our kick-off plantation for which we paid 490,000 euro ($676,000 ) to the local authorities which was then supposed to be distributed among the villagers. We don’t know what happened afterwards.”

Local farmers were not the only ones misled by Bioshape. The company had announced that the plantation would reach a size of 1,000 hectares by the end of 2007, but high costs slowed progress.

“The [Bioshape] company board feared that its shareholders would pull out from the venture”, says Annick Miya-Verstraelen, former head of the Sustainability and Monitoring Department at Bioshape.

Miya-Verstraelen left the company in February 2008, but in November, she found out that Bioshape’s website claimed the jatropha trial plantation covered 350 hectares; but she knew from field reports regularly sent to the board in the Netherlands that it was not yet even 100 ha.

“I believe that the Board resolved to mention a higher figure to convince the shareholders to keep or even increase their investments,” she said.

Hermans is defensive: “We just made a mistake. After conducting the GPS measurement we realised that we had over-counted the number of hectares and that the exact figure was 285 hectares.”

The miscalculations proved fatal. In February 2010, the company suspended its field operations and salaries to local employees. This followed the withdrawal of its major investor, Eneco, which had lost confidence in both the economics and the environmental sustainability of Bioshape’s plans.

The 285 hectare trial plot cleared by Bioshape in Kilwa is still there. The jatropha shrubs have been left without water and are slowly drying out. But the trees cut down to make room for them have disappeared.

“We needed to find a way to use the timber,” Hermans says, “So we made a deal with a company based in Arusha, called Artif which bought part of it.”

Any means

Artif does have a factory in Arusha, in northern Tanzania, which produces and exports furniture to the Netherlands; but its listed headquarters share the same Dutch address as Bioshape in Neer. The company is owned by Chris Pilley, whose girlfriend is the daughter of Cor Vaes, one of Bioshape’s Holland-based managers.

According to its confidential business plan, which IPS is in possession of, Bioshape expected to earn up to $6.7 million in profits from logging and to use this money to partly subsidise its biofuel project.

Around 225 cubic metres of valuable miombo hardwood timber was harvested from just the first 70 hectares to be cleared.

The Bioshape concession includes between 200,000 and 800,000 cubic metres of valuable hardwood, worth $50-150 million.

According to a WWF study, the project’s Environmental Impact Assessment failed to mention that the concession falls within the Namateule/Namatimbili Forest, an important reserve of biodiversity.

The plantation thus poses a risk to seven threatened vertebrate species, according to the Tanzania Forest Conservation Group.

The report also asserts that the claimed reduction of greenhouse gas emissions reported in the EIA in order to fulfil EU directives is not supported by any scientific evidence.

The EIA, required by both the Tanzanian government and the European Directive on the Promotion of Renewable Energy, was conducted by the Tanzanian consultancy company Environmental Management Consultants.

But the provenance of the document itself is in question: one of its authors is identified as Canisius Kayombo, a botanist based at the National Herbarium in Tanzania.

But Kayombo denies taking part in the assessment. He sent an official complaint to the competent authority, the National Environmental Management Council, but the council nevertheless approved the EIA.

In 2009, REM, a British organisation monitoring the use of natural resources worldwide, conducted an investigation and concluded that, Bioshape cut and sold timber without prior permission.

REM recommended that Bioshape be held accountable for its illegal activities.

“In order to cover the gaps that emerged in the EIA, we commissioned two complementary studies on biodiversity and carbon in 2007/2008,” says Jan Paul van Soest, former chair of Bioshape supervisory board.

Looking ahead

“Following the Strategic Impact Assessment conducted by Aid Environment, we decided to preserve the native forests which occupied 50 per cent of the leased land, while the CO2 cycle analysis conducted by CE Delft estimated that our project would generate a net sequestration which was even beyond the European standards which set a threshold of 35 per cent compared to fossil fuels.”

Five years after its ambitious launch, Bioshape’s plantation has produced only a scar on the landscape. Jobs promised to villagers have not materialised, and they have seen only a fraction of the promised compensation for the land they were persuaded to give up.

For the moment, they are able to resume farming within the concession, but they have signed away their title to it and remain vulnerable to the project’s resumption.

Despite the long list of doubtfull practices in the Bioshape project, a number of new investors from the Netherlands, Italy, the Middel East and the US have expressed interest in taking over its business.

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Is BioShape restarting the activities in Tanzania?

Tuesday, March 29, 2011

Since March 17, 2011, the BioShape Holding BV no longer owns Fuel 4 Energy, the holding company for BioShape Tanzania Ltd..
Fuel 4 Energy was sold to the highest bidder for € 50,000.

The new directors since March 17, 2011, are, AP Beheer, VP Beheer, SP Beheer and Beheersmaatschappij Vaes.

It is likely that these managers are also the new owners ofFuel 4 Energy.
Sales of so-called interested parties in Italy, the Middle East and the U.S., as previously suspected, were probably just a red herring.
Eventually, two of the four interested serious buyers remain, the highest bidder has taken the bait for € 50,000.

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Tanzanian Minister tells investors to acquire land legally 

By FINNIGAN WA SIMBEYE October 10, 2011

COMMUNITIES whose land has been irregularly been given to large scale agriculture investors should contact Ministry for Lands, Housing and Human Settlements Development to get back their asset.

Minister for Lands, Housing and Human Settlements Development, Professor Anna Tibaijuka said her ministry is yet to get any complaints relating to land grabbing by Netherlands based BioShape Holdings BV in Kilwa district and Sun Biofuels Plc in Kisarawe district. 

''The most important thing is for the villagers to complain officially so that the process of restitution can start. My ministry will ensure that all land obtained irregularly from villagers is returned to the owners,'' Prof Tibaijuka pointed out. 

She stressed that genuine land leasing to foreign investors should go through Tanzania Investment Centre (TIC) and not otherwise. BioShape which acquired 34,000 hectares of land in Kilwa district in 2006 to cultivate jatropha, managed to do so on a 400ha plot chopping down precious African Blackwood and opening a saw mill at Mavuji village before closing shop in November 2009. 

The company sent home without payment its 102 permanent employees while suspending work at Mavuji blaming global recession for the project's failure while villagers and activists accused BioShape of targeting virgin coastal forests in the district. 

BioShape owners have gone to High Court to block the auctioning of property to compensate workers after a Commission for Mediation and Arbitration early last year. 

Former TIC Executive Director, Emmanuel ole Naiko said the centre was bypassed by ministry officials and BioShape owners in processing the Kilwa land lease agreement. 

''We saw them at the beginning when the process started and advised on how to go about in acquiring land legally but they never came back,'' Mr Ole Naiko told 'Daily News' before his retirement earlier this year. 

Under the 1997 TIC Act, foreign investors are supposed to get a certificate of occupancy for any land that they seek to invest on after getting approval from villagers. BioShape paid over 400m/- in compensation much of it went into pockets of senior Kilwa district and Lindi regional officials. 

World Wildlife fund for Nature expert, Peter Sumbi said the best way forward is for authorities to return the virgin coastal forest land to conservation under villages which had irregularly been deceived to give the same to BioShape. 

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The Dutch Government

Regarding the Dutch holdings, the government in The Hague may wonder whether the intent of the Dutch environmental policy is that we're driving 'green' fuel in the Netherlands, while in Tanzania people are increasingly living in poverty, tropical jungle is harvested and pristine savannahs be plowed to produce this fuel for us.

Why is Fibronot writing so extensively about BioShape businesses?

Mr. W.L. Hermans is the spin doctor. As director of Fibroned he knows the affairs around BioShape in Tanzania better than anyone else . The Tanzania staff of BioShape has been given a gag order and is not allowed to talk with 'outsiders'. Anyone who wants information will be forwarded to Mr Hermans. Investors retreat, wages are being paid too late or not at all, at the slightest deferred payment is requested, or worse, bankruptcy.
Nobody guarantees such practices will not happen at Fibroned.
The Province of Gelderland and the municipality of Apeldoorn are being warned.

By no means these entrepreneurs should get permanent foothold in Apeldoorn.

A known saying of Mr Hermans, spoken several years ago in an open letter to the Dutch policy:
"We do not own the earth, we are the steward for our children. Let us, therefore, be careful what we have."

How sour this sounds, after reading about his adventures in Tanzania.

The editors of Fibronot.nl did their utmost to state the correct facts. The data about the activities of BioShape in Tanzania are based on from authoritative international organizations like the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), Oxfam, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) . UNDP is a part of the United Nations and the largest development organization in the world. These organizations are not infallible, but if the data is confirmed by other organizations or local governments one could be assumed that information in all reports is true.
A personal visit by a member of the editorial board of Fibronot.nl the area where BioShape has some plantations, yielded a wealth of valuable information and shows that even the editors of Fibronot.nl have been reticence to expose the abuses.
Reports of several Colleges and Universities at home and abroad and student theses formed the basis of several listed matters on this website. If in doubt about the sometimes sensitive information in those reports the authors were contacted and further information was requested.

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Sources:
Chamber of Commerce of different countries
Ministry of Agriculture Tanzania
Ministry of Labour Tanzania
Ministry of Natural Resources and Tourism Tanzania
Regional Commissioner for Mediation and Arbitration Kilwa
Association of Tanzania Employers
Tanzania Forest Conservation Group
The Arc Journal Issue 23
The Arc Journal Issue 24
Biofuels, land access and rural livelihoods in Tanzania
Report Independent Monitor of Forest Law Enforcement and Governance in Tanzania
Report Scoping exercise on the Biofuels Industry Within and outside Tanzania
The National Environment Council (NEMC)
The Open University
Eindhoven University of Technology
Tanzania University of Dar es Salaam Tanzania
Land Act 1999
Village land Act 1999
National Biofuel Guidelines

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