Today, the intractable upward mobility of the price of crude has become a major problem to the Western industrialised nations. Friendly governments in Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, Iraq, and even Libya have been of little help in checking the spiraling prices.

The desperation in countries like the United States is turning into forlornness. History says that whenever the West gets desperate enough over any festering issue, they find a solution. The discovery of penicillin is the product of such desperation.

With this level of hopelessness, it will not be surprising if the world is seeing the last days of the lordship of the almighty crude oil.

The West has been talking vigorously about alternatives to crude oil and the developing countries whose economies depend largely on crude oil should take this "threat" very seriously. In US president George W Bush's last state of the union address, he left no one in doubt about America's desperation to get alternatives to crude oil.

There are no secrets about what alternatives US researchers are considering. The West is obviously looking in the direction of biofuels and biodiesel. Currently, there is a dilemma regarding the production of biofuels from food crop feedstock for which people take a dim view.

From the inception of the idea, many people have raised alarm over the production of fuel from food sources. Currently, biofuels are produced from maize, corn, soybeans, rapseed, etc feedstock.

Many among the cognoscenti have warned of the dangerous consequences on global food security if biofuels continue to be produced from staple food feedstock. The current food crisis all over the world should be a wake-up call.

But biodiesel can be, and is being, produced from jatropha in several countries today. Again, countries like China, India, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Brazil, and the southern African nations are already in the forefront of biodiesel production from jatropha.

Purposeful governments around the world know that jatropha is the plant of the future and many countries have already been racing to outpace themselves in the production.

What is more, the very good news is that this is a tropical and semi-tropical plant that does well even in soils that are normally considered useless. As far as Nigeria is concerned, Jatropha has been known all over the country for ages and does very well in the arid and semi-arid areas of the 19 states of northern Nigeria and a few other states in the south.

In the Hausa language, jatropha is called Bindazugu; in Yoruba, it is Lapa-Lapa; and in Igbo it is Ncheogba. It has a name in virtually all Nigerian languages. Jatropha is a drought-resistant, inedible oilseed-bearing tree. It can grow on land deemed useless and unsuitable for growing food crops, so it will not compete with the known and established food crops for land.

It currently grows in the wild in the 19 Northern states and parts of the southern states, especially around Cross River and parts of the South-East where land is available. But it is mainly a northern shrub because of the arid and semi-arid nature of the climate and the availability of vast land not currently used for crop cultivation or not even suitable at all.

Nigeria has 74 million hectares of arable land but only 34 million hectares are currently being utilised. But there are even much more swaths of land that are not considered arable and that is where jatropha and no other food crop will do well. It is easy and very cheap to propagate.

It is not used as food either for humans or animals and can, in fact, be poisonous. So producing diesel from jatropha feedstock, unlike production of biofuels from maize, corn, cassava and even sugar cane will not dangerously impact on the nation's food security.

The shrub takes three years to reach maturity but will then continue to be productive for 30 years. The plant, therefore, has suddenly become an economic shrub that can be passed from one generation to another.

After an initial 18-month period during which the seedlings need to take root, these plants require little or no support in terms of irrigation. The plant is also eminently suitable for intercropping, allowing emergent farmers to plant food crops along with it, especially during the three-year waiting period.

In Nigeria, jatropha remains the looked-down-upon shrub that is used mainly to fence farmlands and properties, but it will make a huge difference to the nation's future if the country begins to respect and take this lowly plant seriously.

Nigeria must aim to be among the world's largest producers of biodiesel within the coming decade just as it is with crude oil today, or else the coming generation will never forgive us.

And why not? The fundamentals of climate and vast land mass favour Nigeria.

Again, the West will have to largely depend on developing countries even for the production of biodiesel. Large companies abroad that have already awoken to the idea and smelt the coffee are rushing to Africa to establish jatropha plantations because they know what this means for the future.

D1 Oils plc, a UK-based international company, has already moved into South Africa, Swaziland , Zambia and Madagascar where the company is working closely with governments in the roll-out of the energy crops.

The company says it intends to lead the way in establishing biodiesel- sustainable energy projects by creating "a green carpet of potential energy in Africa", using non-edible plants for its feedstock.

D1 has been in Africa for about six years now. This company, which designs, builds, owns, operates and markets biodiesel refineries also has a 32,000-tonne biodiesel refinery capacity in North-East England.

Jatropha can save Nigeria if the government commences its programmes at once. Already, Nigeria has some catching-up to do because several other countries have gone far ahead. The only way to succeed is for the federal and state governments to go for broke.

There are several extras that come with the jatropha programme. With jatropha, Nigeria will join the world's burgeoning and very attractive carbon economy seamlessly.

Many parts of Nigeria will become "oil- producing" states overnight with the benefit of resource control. The difference here is that the resources will be controlled by the people themselves who will be the jatropha farmers.