Against a global backdrop of climate change, widespread food insecurity, deforestation and forest degradation, this paper highlights the role of sustainable woodfuel in improving food security. It provides insights into how this role can be strengthened, including through forest management reforms. The widespread availability of woodfuel can present opportunities for employment and sustainable value chains

This title was first published in 2000: Woodfuels in developing countries, particularly Africa, remain a basic need for urban households, who depend heavily on them for their energy needs. This work examines the confusion about the environmental and social impacts of woodfuel use, and the structure of informal sector woodfuel markets. Using data from a year of survey field work in Tanzania, the author questions assumptions of poorly functioning woodfuel markets and their impact on environment and society. Approaching the unregulated woodfuel markets as industrial organizations, the author uses a classic structure previously applied to developed markets in industrialized countries, to determine the competitiveness and efficiency of woodfuel markets. Results indicate well-functioning makets under most circumstances and the study details the variables which enhance market sustainability. The social and environmental implications of woodfuel use as it exists, and suggestions to policymakers for improvements to enhance the sustainability of the system and the environment, complete the study. The study should be useful for those interested in energy and environmental issues or informal markets (including agricultural markets) in developing countries, and to those interested in industrial organization as applied to the Third World.

People scratching a living from parched land, women walking miles for scraps of firewood are both familiar images of Africa. But, in many places, people, with the help of governments and aid agencies, are putting the land into good shape, growing more food and creating a healthy cover of trees. This book joins the literature of hope by looking at these advances from the viewpoint of the energy crisis of the poor. This crisis can only be solved by going beyond the narrow confines of energy to consider all the needs of local people and the potential for change. Drawing on a wide range of case histories, the authors describe the gains in farming and forestry and woodfuel supply that have come about through this broader, people-centered approach. They also write about woodfuel prices, markets and other key elements of survival strategies for the cities. Huge efforts will be needed to recover from the failures of the past, but Leach and Mearns show that important lessons are at last being learned and that new roads to success can be mapped. Originally published in 1988