Since '73, after an Arab-Israeli war known as Yom Kippur war when a coalition led by Egypt attacked Israel at the Forgiveness Day (one of the most important Jewish holidays) which Israeli Defense Forces promptly responded, the Islamic oil traders impose their terror agenda to an apathetical world that prefers to rely on a cheap fossil energy resource instead of investing in the research for cleaner fuels.
It's not so unusual to meet fellow Philippine workers who went to the Arab lands looking for jobs that pay better than in the Philippines, altough working conditions are harder and their Christian beliefs are usually persecuted. It's not so unusual for the Islamic contractors to mandate their overseas non-Muslim workers to avoid eat or drink water at the daylight during Ramadan, a rule that actually should be followed by Muslims only, altough now some clerics allow the Muslim workers to drink water because of the high temperatures there, often beyond the 50°C. When there were only non-Muslim craftsmen dying at the jobsite they really didn't care at all...
A high price is paid for the Arab oil, financing the death of innocent people who would have an opportunity in their own homeland if biofuels were taken more seriously. The only problem is the lack of politic willing to change the povertry status-quo. For the Philippines there is a wide range of possibilities, not just improving the economy but also social and environmental standards.
Instead of spending money with overseas oil that costs the life of Pinoy workers, either vegetable-based or animal fat-based fuels and lubes could improve our energy safety and generate job opportunities and income in our own homeland for our kababayans who wouldn't need to search for a death trap outside our own borders. Also, it's a chance to reduce the starvation: for example, if there were some "sea farms" like the Chilean "haciendas marinas" raising fish that could have its oil (mainly concentrated in the liver of some fish species) processed into lube and heavy fuels (and some of its entrails turned into glue for industrial applications), the carcasses would be a good protein source while some byproducts of the industrial processing could be turned into agricultural fertilizers. It's worth to note that fish usually have a better organic matter-to-protein conversion ratio than poultry or cattle.
Some of the shanty towns and squats around our main cities and municipalities could actually be turned into green belts, replacing the enormous amounts of sheds with some 4-story buildings more widely spaced between, increasing the air flow around and the natural thermal regulation while also leaving space for some small plantations (country-chicken raising can be held alongside, contributing to a biological pest control and increasing the profitability of the operation) that can go from staple foods like yam, sweet potato, cassava, banana and pineapple to oilseeds like castorbean and Jatropha, that can be easily turned into biodiesel and motor oil - the byproducts of its processing can also be turned into organic agricultural fertilizer, therefore another job-creation opportunity to improve both economic and social development.
It can be considered only a daydream by many people, but that's what I honestly think about a better way to deal with energy and food safety.
