BRAZIL: Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi signs agreements with President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva

Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi arrived in the Brazilian capital on Tuesday (March 27) and was greeted by President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. Prodi is in Brazil mainly to discuss the investment by Italian companies to build biodiesel refineries in Brazil. After a closed meeting Lula and Prodi signed a series of bilateral agreements especially in the biofuels technology sector. On Monday (March 26), Prodi announced Italian companies would invest $480 million dollars in Brazil's alternative energy programs. Prodi said the Brazil and Italy's common plans have a huge potential, besides being innovative by including Africa in its agenda. "The future includes bilateral relations, strong bilateral relations. The deal signed between Eni and Petrobras is potentially huge. To me besides its political character, it forces changes in energetic policies that we alone would not do. We should change the Italian productive structure, but we need this international cooperation and the triangle Brazil and Italy operating in African countries is very innovating," he said. Europe is trying to integrate more renewable fuels into its energy matrix but it lacks available agricultural area to produce large quantities of vegetable oils or other feedstocks for biodiesel or ethanol. During his speech President Lula said he shared with Prodi the country's intentions to include Italy as a partner in Brazil's project to expand biofuels market in the world. "I shared with Minister Prodi Brazil's desire to include Italy as a partner in the project to widen the participation of biofuels in the world energetic matrix," he said. Brazil's biofuels market has become one of the hot targets for domestic and foreign investment over the past year or two. The largest Latin American country has the world's most advanced biofuels market in the world, with over 30,000 filling stations that sell pure ethanol or it mixed 20-25 percent with all gasoline. The country is about to make a two-percent biodiesel blend mandatory in all commercial diesel beginning in 2008. Earlier on Tuesday Brazilian state-owned oil giant Petrobras signed a blueprint agreement with the Italian Eni for the development of new technologies in the production of biofuels on a larger scale. Prodi will be heading to Chile later on Tuesday where he will meet with President Michele Bachelet.

ITN Source | March 28, 2007

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