BRUSSELS, Belgium: The European Union will ignore critics who accuse it of helping to boost food prices by embracing an ambitious and binding target for the use of biofuels, officials said Friday.

The European Commission is sticking to its proposal that biofuels account for at least 10 percent of energy used by the EU's huge transportation sector by 2020, because voluntary targets have failed miserably so far, EU spokesman Michael Mann said.

International Herald Tribune