The Story

Why Advanced Biofuels

Having experienced the nuclear disaster that struck Fukushima city on March 11, 2011, that claimed the lives of so many people, preceded by the relentless destruction of the environment from the excessive use of fossil fuels prompted by the ever-increasing demand for energy, GBE Group finds itself compelled to take part in the creation and provision of a more sustainable energy supply for our world. Second generation biofuels, best known as advanced biofuels, have the potential to meet our global society’s energy needs and even compete with fossil fuels. Therefore, we opted for developing advanced biofuels based on key factors embedded in our corporate philosophy. These are, creating carbon dioxide (CO2) neutral, non-food competing renewable energy sources through rehabilitating distressed land in Africa in general and Mozambique in particular.

G-Bio Energy Group business goes beyond creating responsible and sustainable biofuels. Our company use a unique power generation system whereby we convert straight plant oil into energy using special diesel engines and then exploit and convert the waste heat from the power generation system into energy thus minimizing energy loss while maximizing energy efficiency.

Why Africa and Mozambique

As a corporation, our culture is based on pillars of sustainable development goals through creating shared value for our overall stakeholders including but not limited to our shareholders, customers, employees, partners, the environment and society at large. While we believe that our products and services do create and add value to the well-being of our stakeholders’ network, we believe that co-creating value with each and every individual stakeholder is a mandate. As a business, our existence is not merely intended to create economic value, our aim is to create environmental and social value which are equitably distributed as well. To that end, we opted for creating and co-creating value for our stakeholders starting from Africa in general and Mozambique in particular.

Choosing Mozambique was not a difficult decision for several factors including but not limited to weather condition, agro-energy environment, availability of distressed land and above all the geostrategic transportation infrastructure. The weather conditions in Mozambique are suitable for farming oil seeds and plants that can be utilized as biofuel feedstock. Also, the country was in search of vegetable oil-based biofuels to diversify its energy sources and develop an alternative to fossil fuels. There have been some courageous attempts to establish an agro-energy business through a collaboration of the public and private sectors. One of the initiatives that was taken into consideration was the Jatropha Plantation program, yet this initiative did not meet the expectation of the people and thus promptly failed. However, the consensus is the GBE Group will provide a superior solution to the Mozambican energy needs based on both Japanese world class agricultural technology and techniques.

 

A related but distinct reason for our decision is that Mozambique has abundant land that once was flourishing but unfortunately has turned into waste land. Some large coconut plantations have been affected by Lethal yellowing disease, cotton fields have been abandoned, Jatropha land projects have failed, areas have flooded and above all mines have become depleted. Unlike other existing businesses, the GBE Group business model is meant to revitalize these lands while creating environmental, economic and social value that will be equitably distributed not just at the local level but also at an international one while preserving the existing virgin forest land without a food-fuel competition.

Finally, the ongoing transportation infrastructure projects are a motivating factor for the GBE Group. Mozambique has ports facing the Indian Ocean, such as Maputo, Beira and Nacala, which link Southern African countries to other regions like Europe, the Middle East and Asia as gateways. Development along the Nacala and Maputo corridors is suitable not just for our business development, but also will play a significant role in improving local economic activities, which is the corner stone of our business.