Reverse Linkage

98 REVERSE LINKAGE A lmost all households inUganda use either firewood or charcoal for cooking. In 2001, at least 94 per cent of Ugandans depended on wood fuel for cooking. 1 However, in 2016/2017 the number had reduced to 90 per cent, 2 due mainly to the adoption of cheaper sources of energy.Wood fuel is estimated to contributeUS$74.8million to Uganda’s GDP and provide 20,000 jobs to Ugandans 3 . However, these economic gains have led to significant envi- ronmental degradation, eating away Uganda’s forest cover. The country loses 92,000 hectares of forest cover annually 4 – a loss of about one quarter in less than two decades. At this rate, forest resources are likely to be exhausted by 2050. Uganda’s population is estimated at 38.8 million 5 . Of these, about 75 per cent live in rural areas and depend on subsist- ence agriculture, lacking modern sources of energy such as hydro-electric power, liquefied petroleum gas or kero- sene for domestic use. The agricultural sector which also covers the forestry sub-sector contributes over 90 per cent of Uganda’s energy requirements in terms of firewood and charcoal. Uganda meets more than 93 per cent of its energy demand with biomass, 6 per cent with fossil fuel combustion and only 1 per cent with electricity from hydro and fossil fuelled thermal power plants. By 2014, access to electricity (by percentage of population) stood at 20.4, with urban popula- tion coverage at 51.4 and rural at 10.3. 6 The demand for firewood for cooking exceeds natural reproduction, leading to deforestation. 7 The use of firewood and charcoal has also resulted in the depletion of resources such as wetlands, forests, pastures, and fields. Climate change is evidenced by a reduction in water levels in rivers, lakes, and swamps. The ever-rising costs of alternative sources of energy, namely hydro-electric power, kerosene and gas has caused both urban and rural populations to depend heavily on wood charcoal and firewood as a source of cooking fuel. In 2006, the household consumption of firewood and wood for charcoal was estimated at 22.2 million tons, 8 with small industries consuming a further 5.5 million tons creating a total annual biomass demand of 27.7 million tons nationwide. Annual biomass consumption per capita is estimated, for rural and urban areas respectively, at 680 kg and 240 kg of firewood and 4 kg and 120 kg of charcoal. Approximately 4million tons of wood (15 per cent of the total) are consumed to meet the annual demand for charcoal, which in 2010 was estimated by different sources to be between 700,000 and 850,000 tonnes. 9 In Kampala alone charcoal demand was 205,852 tons. Used mainly in urban areas, charcoal use is estimated to increase at 6 per cent per year, which matches the rate of urbanisation. The intervention The Government of Uganda, through the Uganda National Council for Science and Technology (UNCST) obtained a grant from the Islamic Development Bank (IsDB) to under- take a pilot project on Transfer and Commercialisation of Charcoal Manufacturing Technology to Farmers and Entrepreneurs in Uganda. The project objectives were to contribute to improving livelihoods, to generate employ- ment and to augment income through technology transfer. In particular, the initiative sought to promote the use of agricultural waste, sawdust, and other bio-waste from wood in the production of charcoal briquettes for cooking. The project also aided the education of local communities in the production and use of the new technology (charcoal briquettes); development of micro-enterprises; marketing of the briquettes; emphasis of the environmental concerns of using wood charcoal, mitigation of deforestation and encouragement of afforestation strategies. By introduc- ing this technology to the communities, the production of charcoal briquettes from organic waste would gradually replace charcoal and fuel wood. The target beneficiaries were, among others, farmers, wood and charcoal produc- ers, entrepreneurs, women, and the youth. 10 Project methodology and implementation modalities The project became effective in July 2011 with a target of 20 districts out of the country’s 112. The districts were selected UNCST–IsDB project contributes to environmentally friendly charcoal industry in Uganda Dickson Avutia, Charcoal Briquettes Project Manager and Head of Business Development; and Bashir Rajab Kagere, Project Monitoring, Learning and Evaluation Manager and Head of Policy Analysis and Development, UNCST