Charcoal use burns up Africa's forests
Many African businesses and homes use charcoal for heating and cooking. But producing the long-burning fuel could be warming the rest of the world. Gretchen Wilson reports.
A black spot left in the ground of Tanzania's Ruvu South Forest Reserve, which has been pillaged by illegal loggers to make charcoal. (Gretchen Wilson)
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Charcoal maker Ramadan Hamza Hamiz
TEXT OF STORY
Kai Ryssdal: United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon was on Capitol Hill today. He's asking Congress to draft new laws on climate change. He wants to get the United States on board early with a global agreement the U.N. is going to try to hammer out later this year. Nearly 200 countries will be talking about curbing carbon emissions.
Part of the problem, and there are many parts of course, is deforestation in Africa. The U.N. says Africa's losing forests twice as fast as the rest of the world and one reason is the continent's constant need for cheap energy. Gretchen Wilson reports from Tanzania.
GRETCHEN WILSON: On this street corner, men covered in black dust and sweat unload giant bags of charcoal from a truck and onto their shoulders. This charcoal has just come in from the bush, where it was made from fire, sand and local trees.
GEORGE TAIMAVORA: We must pack our bags like this -- full, full, full, up to the top!
Charcoal vendor George Taimavora loads chunks of burnt wood into plastic shopping bags. One bag sells for about a dollar.
TAIMAVORA: The vast majority of Tanzanians don't have electricity! So 90 percent of us use charcoal because it's cheapest, and it's easy!
Charcoal burns longer and hotter than wood alone. It's what fuels many African homes and businesses to heat buildings and to cook and boil water. At Innocent's Restaurant, Maolidi Ali makes french fries over a charcoal flame.
MAOLIDI ALI: I buy a little at a time because that's all I can afford. I need to buy more to make a big business.
But charcoal's production is unsustainable. Brad Smith is with Greenpeace.
BRAD SMITH: Originally there were about 7 million square kilometers of forest in Africa. And about a third of that is gone already.
A lot of it was used to make charcoal, according to the United Nations. Smith says the implications are huge.
SMITH: Scientists are now in agreement globally that about one-fifth of all greenhouse gas emissions actually come from tropical forest deforestation. We really will not be able to get control of climate change unless we can address tropical deforestation.
That's no easy task. There's a rudimentary electricity grid. And most poor countries haven't developed alternative energy sources like solar panels and wind farms. There are few jobs. Here, survival trumps sustainability.
Logging is illegal in Tanzania's Ruvu South Forest Reserve. But only a few scrawny trees remain. The earth is covered in huge patches of black.
Illegal loggers have formed a temporary camp here called Changiri. The shelters are made from ratty sheets and sticks. Twenty-eight-year-old Ramadan Hamza Hamiz is a charcoal maker.
RAMADAN HAMZA HAMIZ: This job is too difficult to do. There is no one who wants to be here. 'cause we are here like animals, you know?
It's dangerous and blistering work for $60 a month. Hamiz says he'd rather work a legitimate job. But first, investors need to create them.
HAMIZ: We wants to go to disco. We wants to have a good family. But because we have nothing to do, we decided ourself to be here for some money.
And the reality is Changiri and other charcoal camps are among the few economic engines around. But as science reveals the links between forests and climate change, Western countries are starting to throw millions of dollars at African governments. They're hoping Africa's leaders will better police protected forests and invest in energy alternatives.
In Tanzania's Ruvu South Forest Reserve, I'm Gretchen Wilson for Marketplace.
Comments
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From Ione, CA, 03/13/2009
Regarding your story yesterday on the use of charcoal for fuel in Tanzania. My good friends, Dick and Joyce Stanley, who have been consultants for many governments and agencies in Africa since their time in the Peace Corps, have developed a technology to produce fuel from waste, such as weeds, paper etc. available locally. The beauty is that the process can be used by communities to develop a product which can be developed simply and sold cheaply, therefore adding to the economy.
Please check out the information on their non-profit organization, Legacy Foundation at: http://www.legacyfound.org/html/photoGallery.html
They work in Tanzania and many other African countries.
From SD, 03/12/2009
In assigning blame for African deforestation to poverty, lack of: electricity, alternative energy sources, foreign investment, etc., etc., Gretchen Wilson completely overlooks the real cause, which is lack of family planning services and runaway population growth. No amount of money and technology can undo the damage of the current birth rate of 6 children per woman.
From Seattle, WA, 03/11/2009
Listeners can find out more about the solar cooking projects mentioned by Pat McArdle above by visiting the Solar Cooking Archive Wiki at http://solarcooking.wikia.com
The direct link to the Darfur refugee projects is here: http://solarcooking.org/Iridimi
From arlington, VA, 03/11/2009
Gretchen states that most developing countries haven't developed alt energy sources like solar panels and wind farms, which are expensive and require technical skills to install and maintain. She did not mention solar thermal cookers. Almost 40,000 of the simplest type of solar cooker (The Cookit) made of cardboard and aluminum foil are right now cooking food and boiling water in three Darfur refugee camps across the border in Chad.
The illegal charcoal trade in Africa, Asia and Latin America will continue to thrive until people in sun-drenched and rapidly deforesting parts of the world are shown how to cook with their most abundant and free source of energy--the sun! Solar cookers are simple devices that can be mass produced and shipped in or built locally to create jobs.
Many who read this post will ask, "what are you supposed to cook with at night and on cloudy days?" I urge you to google "integrated cooking" to learn more about the combined use of solar cookers (when the sun is shining), retained heat cookers to keep food hot for hours and fuel efficient rocket stoves that produce a smokeless, hot flame with tiny amounts of fuel.
In the Chad refugee camps, women have reduced their trips out to search for firewood by 86% when they use integrated cooking. The government of Chad recently banned the use of charcoal in Ndjamena because the illegal charcoal trade was destroying Chad's southern forests. There was rioting in the streets because charcoal was the primary fuel and the people of Ndjamena were desperate. Some are starting to demand solar cookers ("like the refugees have"). A number of us in the solar cooking community are hoping to make that happen very soon. Check out the solar cooking archive wiki for more information on solar and integrated cooking.
Pat McArdle
Board of Directors
Solar Cookers International
Solar Household Energy
03/11/2009
In response to another comment as well as this article,
The "driving cause" is an unstable country. No education, no healthcare, no hope in short. There is no quick solution to this.
The world community will do well to be more hands on with Africa. This is if the countries, like Tanzania, would even allow it.
Money is already being stretched thin around the world. It's a matter of priorities really.
It is hard for anyone in a stable and prosperous country to understand real survival. I am not talking about picking up a second job just to meet the rent... which is tough enough, but rather digging through rubbish, eating things that would be considered criminal to offer anyone here, and not even having four walls and a roof.
It can be very bad in those places. The same can be said of some places in Central and South America. They have an ecological treasure, but how can they understand that if they don't even get a first grade education.
Much more thought needs to be put to Africa, particularly by Africans. However, they will need the tools to allow for more thought. Difficult times.
From Orono, ME, 03/11/2009
Amazing - well, I hate to say it, but the consistency of your appalling myopia makes this no surprise.
So the Tanzanians are cutting the forest for charcoal - not "sustainable" surprise, surprise.
Not one word about the driving cause - the exponential human population explosion. It has DOUBLED in about 20 years. I wonder if that might have something to do with it?
nah - we just need to pump in more money so they can build power plants - and keep expanding.
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