By Mario Osava
RIO DE JANEIRO, Oct 22 2025 – Quadrupling the production and use of sustainable fuels by 2035 is the goal of a new international initiative to drive energy transition and mitigate the climate crisis, which will be launched during Brazil’s climate summit in November.

The Belem Commitment on Sustainable Fuels, led by Brazil with the support of India, Italy, and Japan, awaits the support of other countries after its official launch during the so-called Climate Summit on November 6 and 7 in Belem, northern Brazil.

The meeting of heads of state and government will this time precede the 30th Conference of the Parties (COP30) on climate change, which will be hosted by Belem from November 10 to 21. The unusual separation between the COP and the summit aims to mitigate the accommodation problems of the Amazonian city.

The commitment, nicknamed “Belem 4x,” is based on a report by the International Energy Agency that points to the possibility of quadrupling the volume, adding new alternatives such as green hydrogen, sustainable aviation fuels (SAF), and shipping and synthetic fuels to ethanol and biodiesel.

At COP28, held in 2023 in Dubai, it was agreed to initiate “a transition away from fossil fuels” as an indispensable measure to contain global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius. In Belem, the goal is to implement that consensual decision.

“Brazil was careful not to limit the initiative to biofuels in order to include various sustainable fuels, an important distinction because there are countries, especially in Europe, that oppose biofuels,” warned Claudio Angelo, international policy coordinator for Climate Observatory, a Brazilian coalition of 133 social organizations.

Objections to biofuels include potential environmental damage, land conflicts, and competition with food production, he said by phone to IPS from Brasilia.

Extensive cattle ranching has degraded 100 million hectares in Brazil. One third of this area can be recovered for the cultivation of sugar cane, corn, and oilseeds to double biofuel production, according to a study by the Institute for Energy and Environment. Credit: Mario Osava / IPS

Biofuels market

It is an old Brazilian dream to create a large international biofuels market, due to its large ethanol production and its potential to expand it.

Brazil tried, unsuccessfully, to promote this market in the 1990s and early 21^st century, based on the existence of many sugar cane producing countries, the crop with the highest productivity for this biofuel.

Cuba, once the world’s largest sugar exporter, rejected the proposal with the argument of prioritizing food, despite the decline of its sugar industry and its lack of energy, due to its dependence on imported oil, which became scarce after the fall of the Soviet Union, its major supplier, in 1991.

Brazil became the largest sugar exporter in the mid-1990s, two decades after launching its National Alcohol Program to replace part of its gasoline with ethanol.

It sought to mitigate the economic crisis caused by the rising oil prices, which tripled in 1973 and doubled again in 1979. At that time, the country imported about 80% of the crude oil it consumed; today it exports oil and ethanol.

Many countries use ethanol, blended into gasoline, as a way to reduce pollution. In Brazil, the blend already reaches 30%, and pure ethanol is also used as automotive fuel.

But most passenger cars in the country today are “flex,” consuming gasoline or ethanol and blends in any proportion.

In 2023, the Global Biofuels Alliance was born in New Delhi during the annual summit of the Group of 20 (G20) most relevant industrial and emerging economies, in a new attempt to promote its production.

The City Park, under construction in January, in the Amazonian city of Belem, which will host the debates and negotiations among government delegations and the United Nations at COP30, from November 10 to 21. Credit: Rafa Neddermeyer / COP30

Ambitious goal

Now, at COP30, the aim is to expand the attempt to replace fossil fuels with an ambitious goal: to quadruple the current production of alternative fuels within 10 years.

This follows the path charted at COP28, held in Dubai in 2023, where it was agreed to initiate “a transition away from fossil fuels” as an indispensable measure to contain global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius. In Belem, the goal is to implement that consensual decision.

Currently, this production, basically of biofuels, reaches 175 billion liters, about two-thirds ethanol and one-third biodiesel. The United States surpasses Brazil as the largest producer.

Brazil produced 36.8 billion liters of ethanol and 9.07 billion liters of biodiesel in 2024. In recent years, production of corn-based ethanol has grown, utilizing the surplus of this grain in the country’s central-west region. Its share is already close to 20% of the total.

A study by the Institute for Energy and Environment (Iema), released on October 9, states that Brazil will be able to double this production by 2050 without deforesting new areas. The utilization of degraded pastureland would be sufficient to achieve the goal.

The country has about 100 million hectares of such pastureland, almost entirely abandoned. This is equivalent to twice the territory of Spain and is set to increase, as Brazil has 238 million cattle, far exceeding its 213 million human inhabitants.

From this total, the cultivation aimed at doubling biofuels could occupy 25 to 30 million hectares. Plenty of land would remain for the expansion of food agriculture, emphasized Felipe Barcellos e Silva, a researcher at Iema and author of the study.

According to his calculations, a portion of the pastureland would be allocated to reforestation for biome restoration and environmental protection areas, another part to the recovery of the pasturelands themselves for more productive cattle ranching.

Between 55 and 60 million hectares would remain for energy and food agriculture, with about half for each.

The area for biofuels would vary depending on the choice for more biodiesel, which requires the cultivation of oilseeds, or more ethanol, in which case expanding the area of sugar cane or corn.

The alternatives comprise six scenarios that combine priorities for different raw materials and the option to produce other fuels, such as SAF and green diesel, which is different from biodiesel.

Soy is another monoculture that occupies vast expanses of land in central-western and southern Brazil. Its oil fuels the biodiesel industry by offering surpluses at a low price, since soybean bran is the most in-demand byproduct for livestock feed. Credit: Mario Osava / IPS

Persistent alternatives

“Biodiesel has a problem because it is a degradable organic compound,” unstable, while green diesel is a product of the same vegetable oil but subjected to hydrotreatment and has “physicochemical properties similar to mineral diesel,” explained Roberto Kishinami, a physicist and strategic specialist at the non-governmental Institute for Climate and Society.

Green diesel, he assured, fully replaces fossil diesel without damaging vehicles and has the advantage of emitting fewer urban pollutants than biodiesel, such as fine particulate matter, carbon monoxide, and nitrogen oxide.

“The dozens of biodiesel plants (installed in Brazil) will disappear at some point. They were a temporary solution, favored by the soybean oil surplus, when soybean bran had growing demand,” as livestock feed, Kishinami told IPS by phone from São Paulo.

In his assessment, the energy transition and the decarbonization of transport and industry need sustainable fuels, since electrification is not economically viable for all activities. A combination of the two solutions will have to prevail.

The creation of an international market for these fuels, especially biofuels, depends on standardizing norms and patterns worldwide, a difficult task especially given the rigid European demands.

Furthermore, it faces geopolitical issues, such as “the US-China trade war that will dominate the coming decades,” concluded Kishinami.

Biofuel production in Brazil is growing not only through the expansion of crops but also through technological advances and the utilization of waste.

Second-generation ethanol is already being produced from cane straw, and biomethane, which is equivalent to natural gas, is produced through the biodigestion of vinasse generated in ethanol production, noted Silva.

There is also the beginning of cultivation of the macauba palm (Acrocomia aculeata), which has different names in Latin America and has high oil productivity.

Electrification will take time. It is relatively fast for light vehicles but slow for heavy vehicles, whose useful life reaches about 20 years. This is where decarbonization is achieved through biofuels, argued Silva.

“The transition in transport will continue until at least 2050,” after which biofuels will be able to meet other demands, including power generation, he concluded in a telephone interview with IPS from São Paulo.

The commitment to quadruple sustainable fuels is positive, but it cannot in “any way” dominate the energy debate at COP30, warned Angelo.

“The success of COP30 depends on promoting the implementation of a just, orderly, and equitable transition to eliminate fossil fuels, which are the main cause of global warming,” he concluded.

By Rafiqul Islam
COX’S BAZAR, Bangladesh, Oct 22 2025 – When wild elephant herds come down from the hills in search of food, Sona Miahm, with community volunteers, steps forward to help prevent human-elephant conflicts.

Miah is leading a 14-member elephant response team (ERT) in the Inani forest range under the Ukhiya upazila of Cox’s Bazar, one of the last natural elephant habitats in Bangladesh.

“For lack of food in reserve forests, wild elephants often rush to localities and damage crop fields. And, once we get informed, we go to the spot and try to return the elephant herd to the forest,” he said.

According to the Forest Department, there are now about 64 wild elephants in the reserve forests in Ukhiya and Teknaf in Bangladesh’s southeastern coastal district, Cox’s Bazar.

Community volunteers often risk their lives in returning the wild elephants to the forests, but they do so to protect the country’s last wild mammoths.

He explained how they mitigate human-elephant conflicts in their locality in the Inani area.

“The elephant response teams use hand-mikes and torches to encourage the elephants to return to the forest,” he said.

Members of the elephant response team (ERT) examine an elephant believed to be electrocuted.

With a small grant from the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), Arannayk Foundation, a Dhaka-based conservation organization, formed four elephant response teams (ERTs) in Inani and Ukhiya forest ranges in Cox’s Bazar, comprising 40 men.

Working alongside the Bangladesh Forest Department, these ERTs aim to minimize human-elephant conflicts and support wildlife rescues. The ERTs have helped prevent 127 potential human-elephant conflicts in the past two years.

Dr. Mohammed Muzammel Hoque, national coordinator of UNDP’s GEF Small Grants Program, said the UNDP provided a small grant of USD 39,182 in September 2023 to the Arannayk Foundation to implement its two-year Ecosystem Awareness and Restoration Through Harmony (EARTH) project.

Programme coordinator Abu Hena Mostafa Kamal said the project was implemented to restore forest ecosystems and involve local communities in wildlife conservation.

Human-Elephant Conflicts Rise

Due to the destruction of their natural habitats caused by deforestation, hill-cutting, and unplanned industrial expansion, the wild elephants come into localities in search of food, resulting in the rise of human-elephant conflicts.

Conflicts have resulted in the deaths of both community members and elephants.

Elephants are often being killed by electrocution in the Bangladesh southeast region since farmers install electric fences around their crop fields to protect crops from damage.

The most recent incident of an elephant being killed occurred in the Dochhari beat within the Ukhiya forest range in Cox’s Bazar on September 17, 2025. Mozammel Hossain, a resident of Ukhiya, said farmers had used electrified traps around their croplands and this electrocuted the elephant

He said food shortages push elephant herds to enter crop fields, while some farmers resort to illegal and lethal methods against the mammoths.

The Ukhiya and Teknaf regions have reported at least four elephant deaths in the past year.

Abdul Karim, an ERT member in the Boro Inani area of Cox’s Bazar, said elephants often attack human settlements and damage crops and orchards, increasing their conflicts with humans.

“We try to mitigate human-elephant conflicts and save both humans and mammoths. But, since 2021, four people have been killed in elephant attacks near the Inani forest range,” he said.

According to the Wildlife Management and Nature Conservation Division of the Bangladesh Forest Department, from 2016 to January 2025, 102 elephant deaths were recorded alone in Chattogram.

Retaliatory killings, electrocution, poaching, and train collisions have caused many of these deaths.

Saiful Islam, a resident of the Inani area, said wild elephants have been trapped within their habitat too after the influx of Rohingyas there in 2017.

Introduce Elephant Non-Preferred Crops

Crops typically eschewed by elephants, including citrus, pepper, bitter gourd, chili, cane, and okra, should be introduced around the elephant habitats.

“We are encouraging farmers to start such crops to avoid conflicts with elephants. We are also making them aware of elephant conservation,” Saiful Islam, also a community volunteer at Choto Inani, told IPS.

Firoz Al Amin, range officer of the Inani forest range in Ukhiya, said the Forest Department arranged 12 awareness programmes on elephant conservation in the Inani range.

Arannayk Foundation identified elephant non-preferred plots adjacent to high human-elephant conflict zones within the buffer area. With community involvement, five demonstration plots were created on portions of land belonging to five beneficiaries to mitigate elephant crop raiding.

It established four chili-coated rope bio-fences: two at Mohammad Shofir Bill and one each at Boro Inani and Imamerdeil to reduce crop damage caused by elephants. These bio-fencing interventions have benefited 85 vulnerable households in these locations. The fences consist of coconut ropes coated with a deterrent blend of chili powder, tobacco, and grease, suspended at human height between trees to prevent elephant access to agricultural and residential areas.

Urgent Measures Needed to Save Elephants

A 2016 survey by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) said that there were only 457 elephants left in Bangladesh, of which 268 were wild, 93 were migratory, and 96 were captive.

However, about 124 wild elephants died across Bangladesh’s main elephant habitats—Cox’s Bazar, Chattogram, Chittagong Hill Tracts and Mymensingh—over the last decade.

Experts suggest a comprehensive strategy for restoring elephant habitats to prevent their extinction, which requires long-term planning, reducing encroachment on forest areas, and removing unlawful occupants.

Dr. Monirul H. Khan, a zoology professor at Jahangirnagar University, said forests and elephant habitats must be protected at any cost to save the mammoths, as their number is dwindling day by day in Bangladesh.

Many new settlements and crop cultivations have taken place inside the country’s elephant habitats, he said, accelerating human-elephant conflicts.

Growing crops that elephants typically do not prefer, improving bio-fencing with trip alarms, and creating salt lick areas can all help reduce human-elephant conflicts.

The experts say implementing beehive fencing not only safeguards crops but also generates job and income opportunities for the local community. Therefore, it is possible to achieve elephant conservation while simultaneously minimizing human-elephant conflicts.

Monirul said the Bangladesh government has taken on an elephant conservation project with its own funding for the first time. “I hope the project will help conserve the mammoths in Bangladesh,” he added.

IPS UN Bureau Report

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By UN Women
NEW YORK, Oct 22 2025 – When the Taliban recently cut off the Internet and phone networks across Afghanistan, millions of women and girls were silenced. For those with connectivity, the blackout severed their last link to the outside world – a fragile connection that had kept education, work, and hope alive.

Many women in Afghanistan still lack access to the Internet, a basic phone, or the literacy to use digital tools. For those that do, that connection is a rare lifeline to life-saving services and the outside world.

For now, access has largely been restored. But the message was clear: in Afghanistan, this valuable gateway to learning, expression, and services for women and girls can be shut down at any moment.

Afghan women are already banned from secondary and higher education, from most forms of work, and public spaces such as parks, gyms, and sports clubs.

Many women are also receiving humanitarian aid, including in earthquake-affected eastern Afghanistan, and among those returning – many forcibly – from Iran and Pakistan.

The digital and phone blackout intensified feelings of stress, isolation and anxiety among women and girls.

Women entrepreneurs participate in business development training in a UN Women-supported Multi-Purpose Women’s Centre in Parwan province, eastern Afghanistan in January 2025. Photo: UN Women/Ali Omid Taqdisyan

What happens when Afghan women and girls go offline?

In Afghanistan, the impact of Internet and phone blackouts falls more heavily on women and girls. It eliminates what is, for many, a final means of learning, earning, and connecting.

When women and girls lose Internet access, they lose the ability to:

• Access aid: Those who are connected can use the Internet or phones to find out about support available, and aid agencies rely on connectivity to continue operations.
• Learn about disasters: Recent data shows 9 per cent of women use the Internet to access information on climate disasters.
• Seek services and reporting mechanisms for survivors of gender-based violence or those at risk.
• Learn: Online classes and study groups were a lifeline for girls banned from secondary schools, and women banned from universities.
• Work: Online businesses are a vital source of income for many women to sustain their families after being pushed out of many formal roles.
• Connect: Social apps and social media provided safe spaces to support one another and exchange information.
• Be visible: For women already excluded from public life, the digital world is one the last places to exist and resist.

For more on what life looks like for women in Afghanistan today, see our FAQs.

Going dark in the middle of humanitarian crises

The national internet blackout started a month after a 6.0 earthquake struck eastern Afghanistan on 31 August, with major aftershocks continuing throughout September and the emergency response and early recovery continuing.

Despite facing many challenges, women-led organizations have played a crucial role delivering life-saving aid and services to women and girls affected by the earthquake, and Afghan women and girl returnees from neighbouring Iran and Pakistan.

During the blackout, NGOs were forced to halt humanitarian operations and cease field missions to emergency sites. Staff could not process payments or place orders for essential goods destined for women and their families.

When banks went offline, women affected by humanitarian crises were unable to access emergency cash assistance to buy essentials such as food.

The shutdown also made it much harder for survivors of gender-based violence to access help at a time when household tensions were rising across the country, and the risk of violence was escalating.

A UN Women team assessed the earthquake damage in Nurgal, one of the worst affected districts in Kunar province, northeastern Afghanistan.

Online livelihoods switched off

In Afghanistan, waves of directives banning women from most jobs and restricting their movement without a male guardian have systematically pushed them out of public life.

For many women entrepreneurs, the Internet offers a rare space to work, build small businesses, and sell their products – such as nuts, spices, handicrafts, clothes and artworks – to customers within Afghanistan and overseas.

“There is no space for us to work outside our homes,” explained business owner Sama*, from Parwan in eastern Afghanistan. “There’s also no local market where we can display and sell our products.”

With the support of UN Women, Sama built an online shop selling knitted bags, purses and jewelry.

“Through my online shop, I became well known,” she says. “I’m earning money, solving my financial problems, and becoming self-sufficient.”

When the blackout struck, women like Sama lost their only source of income overnight – a warning that for many Afghan women, connectivity is not a luxury, but a lifeline.

From blackout to global action

The Internet blackout in Afghanistan was a stark reminder that the digital world is not neutral. It can be space of empowerment. It can also be a tool of exclusion and isolation.

The stories of Afghan women remind us what is at stake: education, mental health, livelihoods, and hope. When women are silenced online, they are cut off further from opportunity and from the world.

How UN Women is supporting women and girls in Afghanistan

Through its flagship programme, Rebuilding the Women’s Movement, UN Women in Afghanistan partnered with 140 women-led organizations across 24 provinces and supported 743 women staff with salaries and training – amplifying resilience even as public life is restricted.

Read more about our work in Afghanistan.

*Name was changed to protect her identity.

IPS UN Bureau

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By External Source
Oct 22 2025 (IPS-Partners)

 
We are in a climate emergency.

The Earth is already over 1.3 °C warmer than pre-industrial times.

2024 was the hottest year ever recorded.

More than 150 climate disasters struck the world last year.

Extreme weather displaced over 800,000 people.

Wildfires and floods now define the new normal.

We are failing the 1.5 °C goal unless we act now.

COP30 is coming to Belém, Brazil, in November 2025.

But talk is not enough.

We must shift systems, not just carbon.

From blind targets to equitable transitions.
From fossil lock-in to regenerative energy.
From climate policy at arm’s length to climate justice at the core.

Every fraction of a degree matters; now more than ever.

Women, Indigenous Peoples, and low-income communities pay the highest price.

We need mass decarbonization, climate finance, and rights-based adaptation.

We need unity across sectors, borders, and generations.

The choices we make today will decide the severity of tomorrow.

October 24 | International Day for Climate Action.

Act now. For Justice. For Survival.

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