AS British food prices soar because of the global scramble to switch from cereal/crops to bio-fuel production, a heavyweight conservation body has joined the debate by declaring that the change may have the opposite effect to that intended.

The much-respected Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, Britain's largest wildlife charity, is claiming that bio fuel production will add to global warming rather than the reverse.

In a statement issued yesterday, the RSPB demanded that the Government "shelve legislation forcing oil companies to sell more biofuel, until there is proof that this new fuel is truly green."

The statement went on: "Vast areas of South America are being razed and covered in energy crops to sate the demand for biofuels from Europe and the US.

"Food shortages are increasing in Africa where the best farmland is being switched from food to grow corn and sugar cane for ethanol and biodiesel.

"Rainforest is being felled rapidly in Indonesia and Malaysia to clear land for palm and soya, for biofuel as well as food and other products.

"In Britain and other parts of Europe, wildlife-rich set-aside has been scrapped to free up land for energy and food crops, with no measures in place to replicate its environmental benefits."