~ The Honorable Jeb Bush, Governor of the State of Florida, His Excellency Roberto
Rodrigues, Former Minister of Agriculture of Brazil and Ambassador Luis Alberto
Moreno, President of the IDB, Will Launch Commission on December 18 to Promote Usage of Ethanol in Gasoline pools of the Western Hemisphere ~

November 15, 2006 (Miami, FL) – On December 18, the Honorable Jeb Bush, Governor of the State of Florida; His Excellency Roberto Rodrigues, President of the Superior Council of Agribusiness of FIESP and Former Minister of Agriculture of Brazil and; and Ambassador Luis Alberto Moreno, President of the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), will announce the initiation of the Interamerican Ethanol Commission. The announcement will take place during a breakfast at the historic Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables, Florida. Bush, Rodrigues and Moreno serve as Co-Chairs of the commission, which has as its mission to promote the usage of ethanol in the gasoline pools of the Americas.

Minister Rodrigues will be joined by a distinguished Brazilian delegation that includes Luis Carlos Guedes, Minister of Agriculture; Linneu Carlos da Costa Lima, Deputy Minister of Production and Agroenergy; Silvio Crestana, President of EMBRAPA; and Silas Oliva, Director of Petrobras. Governor Bush is to be accompanied by several key board members and staff of Florida FTAA, including Ambassador Charles E. Cobb, Chairman of Florida FTAA; Brian C. Dean, Executive Director of Florida FTAA and the co-chairs of the Florida FTAA Ethanol Advocacy Committee: Jorge L. Arrizurieta, Chair, International Policy Group, Akerman Senterfitt; Dominique Virchaux, Virchaux & Partners; and Mario Fernandez, President, COFE Properties, LLC. Ambassador Moreno will be joined by several top officials from the IDB, including senior staff of the bank’s section for Alternative Sources of Energy. Additional attendees will include corporate leaders, scientific experts, and other local government leaders.

In addition, the launch will feature championship IndyCar drivers, senior IndyCar executives, and the Indy Ethanol Show Car. IndyCar is a leading motor-sports into a new era by adopting 100% ethanol as its fuel of choice for the 2007 racing season which begins at Homestead-Miami Speedway on Saturday March 24. Both IndyCar and its partner EPIC (the Ethanol Promotion and Information Council) will be honored with the 2007 Akerman Senterfitt Ethanol Innovator in Sports Award. According to IndyCar executives, ethanol is less costly, better for the environment, and is a superior octane burner, actually increasing the speed and power the sport demands.

Bush, Rodrigues, and Moreno will discuss the main objectives of the commission, which include: promoting increased ethanol blended fuel use throughout the Western Hemisphere; promoting the integration of technical and scientific research efforts across the hemisphere related to the production and distribution of ethanol; determining investment needs in both agriculture and infrastructure to enable a hemispheric-wide market for ethanol blended fuel; determining the economic and environmental implications of carbon credits produced by the project; encouraging the development of environmentally sound ethanol operations; and recommending a set of actions in order to create an international market for ethanol and an Inter-American Ethanol Organization (IEO).

The commission will educate governments and legislatures throughout the hemisphere on ethanol through a series of “road shows”. In addition to disseminating information, generating media coverage, and promoting public discussion of the benefits of ethanol, these road shows will secure partnerships from local officials and interested groups in order to expand ethanol usage and production for export.

The formation of this commission grew out of a policy proposal Governor Bush submitted to Washington in April. The governor’s “Hemispheric Wide Approach to Ethanol” holds that the United States should adopt a bold initiative to pump 15 billion gallons of ethanol annually into the marketplace by 2015 (“15 by ’15”) – nearly 10 percent of current national demand for gasoline and double the amount required by the Energy Policy Act of 2005.

The Interamerican Ethanol Commission promotes the usage of ethanol in the gasoline pools of the Western Hemisphere and is co-chaired by Governor Jeb Bush, State of Florida; Roberto Rodrigues, President, Superior Council of Agribusiness of FIESP and Former Brazilian Minister of Agriculture; and Ambassador Luis Alberto Moreno, President of the IDB. The commission will serve to foster awareness of the benefits of renewable fuels to economies throughout the Americas and contribute toward a framework for a rationalized and viable regional marketplace in ethanol, promoting the policy guidance necessary to spur both foreign and domestic investment in renewable fuel production and infrastructure.

Florida FTAA, Inc. is the private-public entity led by Governor Jeb Bush, City of Miami Mayor Manny Diaz, Miami-Dade County Mayor Carlos Alvarez and officials throughout the State of Florida with the mission that Miami, Florida become the site of the Permanent Secretariat of the Free Trade Area of the Americas. Florida FTAA is chaired by Ambassador Charles E. Cobb, Jr. and managed by Executive Director Brian C. Dean. The administrative offices are located at the Biltmore Hotel Conference Center of the Americas in Coral Gables, Florida.