The Miami Herald Posted on Wed, Apr. 16, 2003 BY NERY YNCLAN nynclan@herald.com

Tonight, Soiby Siedner will have 22 people over for dinner, Thursday, 25. They will be treated to Passover recipes that have fed generations of her family and traveled thousands of miles from Romania to Peru to Colombia -- and now her South Florida table.

''The shredded potatoes with egg and onion and starch is from my mother's grandmother,'' says Siedner, a Peruvian, who moved to Plantation from Colombia three years ago with her husband and three children. ``And from my husband's side I have recipes that go way, way back to his great, great, great-grandmother.''

The Passover spread will be a taste of home for her and thousands of other Latin American Jewish families who have made their own exodus from beleaguered homelands. Economic and political upheaval, particularly in Argentina, Venezuela and Colombia, has brought thousands of Latin American Jews to South Florida in recent years -- so many that the Miami-Dade and Broward Jewish federations as well as temples have set up Latin programs to help the new arrivals settle in and make new friends.

Temples in both counties will be serving Passover dinners tonight and Thursday to those without extended families to share in the holiday that marks the exodus of Jewish slaves from Egypt.

VARIED CULTURES

''They come from every possible country of Latin America, and each has a different culture, different accent, and come escaping different situations,'' says Rabbi Samuel Kieffer of Temple B'nai Aviv in Weston. ``But all of them share in the ancient story of Passover, the exodus from Egypt to find freedom that is still being lived out in their life stories.''

It was the country's economic hardships that drove Karina Butensky and her family from Argentina three years ago.

''We didn't see a future there, so we decided we had to come here,'' says Butensky, a mother of two in Plantation. ``We have everybody still in Argentina. We miss them a lot. It's very hard -- especially on a holiday.''

Butensky says she will still host a warm celebration with many friends and many traditional dishes, including the gefilte fish she makes from scratch.

''Passover is a real family holiday,'' says Butensky, who works at a Hebrew day-care center. ``For Latin families who don't have their families with them, it's very important for friends to sit together.''

Juan Dircie, of Jewish Community Services' new Latin American Immigration Program, says some 450 new families in Miami have registered in the last year. But he estimated that thousands more are going directly to temples or friends for orientation and much needed sponsors so they can stay in this country.

OUTREACH PROGRAMS

Temple Menorah in Miami Beach, for example, has hired six Argentines to handle community outreach and started an institute of Latin American Jewish studies to prepare young people for professions in Jewish leadership.

The Jewish Federation of Broward County has helped start Hebraica, a religious and social club for newly arrived Latin Jews who want to meet other families. Many temples have added services in Spanish one night a week to accommodate the new immigrants.

''The majority are professionals, bilingual, very involved in their Jewish communities back home,'' says Dircie. ``In Latin American countries, Jewish education is very strong. They especially emphasize Jewish day school, where the children learn secular studies in the morning and all afternoon is dedicated to Judaic and Hebrew studies.''

Latin American Jews are from both Ashkenazic and Sephardic traditions. The Ashkenazi are usually of eastern European descent, as are most American Jews, and the Sephardi are usually descended from Moroccans, Turks, Greeks and Syrians who ended up in Spain -- only to be driven out by the Spanish Inquisition.

The storied migrations of the Jewish people make for a flavorful blending of cultures that have made their way to the Passover table.

MOROCCAN INFLUENCE

Rabbi Abraham Bencaquen was born in Spain, but his grandparents were from Morocco so the leader of Miami Beach's Torad Mosche celebrates the holiday with a table of Moroccan-influenced delights. His congregation is entirely Latin, the majority Cuban.

''In my house, except for the gefilte fish, we eat like you eat in Morocco,'' Bencaquen says.

The rabbi's favorites include spicy Moroccan fish with cilantro, hot dried peppers and lima beans and meatballs with peas, according to his wife, Rachel, who comes from an Ashkenazi Hungarian-Romanian background.

Rachel was born in Israel but lived for many years in Venezuela and Panama.

''Right now, I'm frying some potato latke, which is from the Ashkenazi,'' says the mother of five. ``Many years ago when I met my husband, I started to learn all the Moroccan foods, and now I make the best from both traditions.''

For those recently arrived, Passover fare will be comfort food to ease the longing of being so far from home.

Aventura architect Maya Hager moved here from Ecuador five years ago to attend the University of Miami. Last year her parents joined her, but she says holidays are still just not the same.

''I'm coming from a small Jewish community where everybody knows everybody for generations,'' she says. ``Everybody here is new -- you don't know where they come from. There are so many temples, so many organizations.

``This holiday is going to be weird. It's the first time we won't be with our family in Ecuador or with my mother's family in Israel.''

Colombian Isaac Wancier arrived a year ago to join his brother who had come the year before. He says the situation is so bad in his country it seems no one can find work and the fear of kidnapping is ever looming.

''You just feel unsafe in Colombia,'' says Wancier, who is working for a Broward refinishing products company. ``It's such a beautiful country, and we can't leave the city because you could be kidnapped. Many more Colombians will be coming -- Jewish and non-Jewish.''

Wancier says moving here has not been a panacea, as he has found it hard to make friends and meet a nice woman.

''I'm 36 and desperate. Starting in a new country is very hard,'' he says. Nonetheless, this Passover will be nice -- his mother is visiting for the holiday.

''Now I have my mama for two weeks,'' he says. ``Then, I eat the junk food again.''

16 April 2003 By Athena Jones, Environmental News Network-Reuters

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina — Natural-gas-powered cars have long been preferred by cabbies who spend hours on city streets here, and these days, they can also be spotted among Argentina's smart set after an economic collapse made them a cheap, yet chic, choice.

Businessmen in suits and sedans are lining up at filling stations around Buenos Aires for CNG (compressed natural gas), and lines for the fuel were 50 cars deep along the highways leading to beaches this summer.

Argentina, with the third-biggest natural gas reserves in Latin America after Bolivia and Venezuela, is spearheading the use of CNG in vehicles and leads the world in the number of natural-gas cars with about 800,000.

The economic crisis here has had the unexpected effect of helping the environment. The fuel is cheap, clean burning, and produces fewer harmful emissions than gasoline or diesel. CNG cars today make up 15 percent of Argentina's personal vehicles.

The drive to use an abundant national resource as fuel in Argentina echoes similar attempts in Brazil, the world's No. 1 sugar producer, to encourage the use of cane-based ethanol to cut pollution and reduce dependence on oil, even though both countries are oil producers.

"It's got some potential. It's one piece of a very large puzzle. It has a lot of application in areas where there's a lot of natural gas," said Jed Bailey, a director of research for Latin America at Cambridge Energy Research. "And Argentina has the infrastructure for it."

Argentina also has a new economic reality after the January 2002 peso devaluation pumped up dollar-based gasoline and diesel prices more than 30 percent.

"It's less expensive. I'd say I save 20 to 30 pesos a day," said Luis, who drives as part of his work for an energy company.

His investment two months ago to outfit his silver Peugeot to run on CNG has already saved him about 1,500 pesos (US$515), about 200 pesos more than it cost to convert the motor.

Argentina's government has also jumped on the bandwagon, promoting natural gas use to cut costs in public transportation.

Some here argue compressed gas is the fuel of the future. Argentina's Chamber of Compressed Natural Gas, which joins providers and equipment makers, is at work on a Latin American project to unify standards to create a continent-wide network that can later be taken to other parts of the world.

"There's a revolution going on in the energy sector that developed countries aren't taking notice of. Developed countries are betting on the fuel cell idea, but that's for some 20 years from now," said chamber member Gregorio Kopyto.

NATURAL GAS AROUND THE WORLD

Compressed gas is being promoted for use in vehicles in India, South Korea, and Thailand, where it is seen as a good way to reduce oil imports in a region where crude oil reserves are small but gas reserves are high in several countries.

Engineers in Italy have been working on a scooter that runs on natural gas. The fuel has also seen increased use in the United States in vehicle fleets such as school and city buses, police cars, and airport ground service vehicles, according to U.S. government and private sector reports.

Argentina exports natural gas vehicle technology to Asia, Europe, and Latin America, and the chamber plans to help host a natural gas vehicles conference in Buenos Aires in 2004.

For natural gas to be a workable alternative fuel, it must be widely available and the proper infrastructure must be in place. Creating a network of natural gas stations and converting vehicles may not be cost-effective in some places.

"You have to make it convenient enough for people to want to do it, and it can't be so prohibitively expensive that they won't," said Linda Doman, an expert for international issues at the U.S. Department of Energy's Energy Information Administration. "You have to have a certain amount of gas stations; otherwise people couldn't drive very far," Doman said.

Argentina opened its first compressed gas station in 1984 and now has 1,100 outlets in 17 provinces, making it available to a majority of its 5.4 million car owners. About 110,000 cars were converted last year alone.

The local Fiat , Volkswagen, and Peugeot units make CNG cars that also run on gasoline. A natural-gas car costs about 10 percent more than the standard version, a Volkswagen spokesman said. The fuel is stored in a metal cylinder that can take up much of the trunk.

GAS AND GOVERNMENT

A bill that would require that all public transportation run on the fuel and provide incentives for the gas sector is wending its way through Congress.

"To keep bus tickets at the current level, the state is subsidizing diesel prices, which is costing around 20 million pesos a month ($6.9 million)," Energy Secretary Enrique Devoto said in an interview after the bill was presented. "The cost difference would allow us to, for a short time, use the subsidy to fit the bus motors to run on compressed gas. That would lower costs by half and make it possible to maintain accessible ticket prices."

The savings are key for the cash-strapped government, where a deep recession led to the biggest ever sovereign debt default last year. Using the fuel could also limit inflation, as the peso has lost about 70 percent in value since devaluation.

CNG costs 60 percent less than the cheapest gasoline at the station where Luis filled his tank, run by Repsol YPF .

Natural gas is just one of many alternative fuels, along with liquefied petroleum gas, methanol, solar energy, biodiesel, hydrogen, and electricity.

Whether it is the wave of the future or not, the fuel is likely to remain a focus of efforts to reduce dependence on costly oil in Argentina — and one welcomed by those watching their wallets.

"I travel a lot of kilometers (miles), and I spend a lot less — at least 30 or 35 percent less," said cab driver Miguel Angel Granja, who converted his car as soon as the option became available. "I have to fill the tank three times a day, but it's still cheaper than diesel."

By TOM MORTON Casper Star-Tribune staff writer

The coalbed natural gas industry has waited 34 months for the U.S. Bureau of Land Management to issue its Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) on drilling on federal land in the Powder River Basin, an industry official said Monday.

It will probably wait some more, Bruce Hinchey, president of the Petroleum Association of Wyoming, told the Casper Rotary Club. "We're at 34 months and counting," he said.

"We were expecting it on the 17th (of April), but it was delayed a week," Hinchey said. "We expect a lawsuit by environmental groups."

That would mark the latest delay in new drilling in the Powder River Basin that has slowed to a standstill now that the federal government has issued the maximum number of drilling permits, he said.

Developing a natural gas field in Wyoming takes between four and five years, Hinchey said.

He laid the blame for the delay in the basin on the federal government's environmental policies, such as allowing drilling at certain times of the year but not at other times.

Some federal policies are extreme, he said.

For example, if digging for a pipeline will expose rocks that are a different color than the ground, the excavated rocks must be painted the same color as the ground, Hinchey said.

In response to a question from Rotarian David Bishop, Hinchey said that there's no way to calculate how much Wyoming has lost in revenues because of the federal policies and the delays in new drilling.

Hinchey, former Wyoming House Speaker, became director of the PAW during his last term in the Senate in 2002.

During his talk, he gave a brief overview of the oil and gas industry's history in Wyoming, starting with the first well 118 years ago drilled southeast of Lander.

Now, 20 of Wyoming's 23 counties -- with the exceptions of Platte, Goshen and Teton counties -- have oil or gas production, Hinchey said.

"We don't have any yet in Yellowstone, but we're working on that," he joked to a lot of laughter.

More than 15,000 miles of pipeline operated by 42 companies, Hinchey later added, are in all Wyoming counties.

In other statistical matters, he said the deepest well drilled in Wyoming was more than 25,000-feet deep, and yielded a dry hole. The deepest producing well is 24,877 feet, he said.

The oil and gas industry employs about 22,000 people who earn an annual payroll of $850 million, he said.

While the industry has begun to decline in Campbell County -- in the Powder River Basin -- it is up in Carbon, Sweetwater and Sublette counties, Hinchey said.

Hinchey showed the audiences charts of production and sales that marked the downward trend of oil production and the upward trend of gas production.

Limited pipeline capacity, however, hinders the rate of gas production, he said.

Yet that production pays more than $900 million a year for much of Wyoming's state and local government operations, Hinchey said. "That equals a direct payment of $1,900 for every person in Wyoming. ... You can see without the oil and gas industry what kind of taxes you would pay."

He also listed the countries that export oil to the United States, with the most coming from Canada, followed by Saudi Arabia, Mexico, Venezuela, Nigeria, the United Kingdom, Iraq, Norway, Angola and Algeria.

"Fifty-seven-point-eight (percent) of the total is from foreign countries," Hinchey said. "That's why it's so important for Congress to have the national energy policy bill."

TBO.com By CHERIE JACOBS cjacobs@tampatrib.com Published: Apr 16, 2003

TAMPA - Prices at the pump have dropped more than a dime in the past month because of speedy success in Iraq, analysts say.

Across the country, the average price of a gallon of self-serve regular is $1.59 - the lowest since Feb. 10, when it was $1.57. That's down from $1.72 a month ago.

In Florida, the average price is $1.63 a gallon, down more than 9 cents. In Tampa, the average is $1.59.

But gas prices depend a lot on what members of the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries decide, and OPEC is meeting next week to cut oil production to lower supplies and boost prices..

``If that happens, we will definitely see gas prices go up,'' said Yoli Buss of AAA Auto Club South.

Plus, fallout from turmoil in Venezuela could create a gas crunch this summer, the U.S. energy secretary said Tuesday.

Gas prices usually rise in summer as demand increases, Buss said.

As crude oil became more expensive, gasoline prices began to rise shortly after the first of the year.

The American Petroleum Institute cited several reasons for that: the strike in Venezuela that reduced exports to the United States, tight worldwide crude oil supplies, and nervousness about with Iraq that had traders bidding up prices.

Now, crude prices have dropped from $40 a barrel to about $28.

Reporter Cherie Jacobs can be reached at (813) 259-7668.

<a href=washingtontimes.com<Washington Times- EDITORIAL • April 16, 2003

     The death toll of Americans fighting terror and narco-trafficking in Colombia has reached five since February 13, after a State Department coca-duster flown by an American was shot down last week. About 150 U.S. troops are still combing Colombia, looking for three Americans kidnapped in February by the most brutal terrorist group in the Western Hemisphere, the FARC.

     Colombia's narcotics and terrorism cabals are spreading violence beyond Columbia. They have been given sanctuary in Venezuela, are involved in coca cultivation in Peru, are behind some drug-related violence in Brazil and launch forays into Ecuador. This regional aspect of the Colombian problem has developed a dangerous dynamic. Eyewitnesses claim the Venezuelan military has selected which narco-terror group they are backing, and are bombing their adversaries in Colombia. Thus far, the Colombian response has been subdued. But, if such bombing continues, the situation could erupt in conflict.

     Washington has taken some key steps toward meeting the challenge. Since July 2000, the United States has given Colombia almost $2 billion to combat drug trafficking and terrorism. Last year Washington approved a trade pact for Colombia and its neighbors. But, the region also needs the United States to help coordinate a regional approach to mitigate the transnational threat.

     Colombia and its neighbors must do a better job of policing their borders to contain the narco-terrorist danger. Since resources in these countries are limited, cooperation is essential. And here, Brazil, which has warm ties with Venezuela, must intervene to convince the government of President Hugo Chavez to stop harboring terrorists.

     The United States should share its extensive customs, interdiction and border patrol expertise by holding joint training sessions with authorities from Colombia and surrounding nations. The donor countries helping Colombia must also provide the funds and know-how to bolster the country's rural development. Colombian authorities only control about 60 percent of the country. Therefore, much of the nation is a kind of no-man's land that provides the ideal habitat for terrorists.

     Before the violence in Colombia claims more American lives and causes greater regional instability, the administration should become more active in seeking solutions. Colombia's problems can't be eradicated overnight. But, with U.S. help, they can be steadily reduced.