Promouvoir des systèmes durables de combustibles ligneux: Examen de la littérature et recommandations pour la conception de programmes

PRODUCTIVE LANDSCAPES (PROLAND) PROMOTING SUSTAINABLE WOODFUEL SYSTEMS: A REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR PROGRAM DESIGN JULY 2021 This publication was produced for review by the United States Agency for International Development. It was prepared by Tetra Tech. The Productive Landscapes (ProLand) project supports USAID Missions to improve land use management using a systems approach to resilient development that integrates ecological, economic, and governance aspects. Using primary and secondary research, ProLand develops and disseminates evidence-based guidance around best management practices for sustainably intensifying land use. The ultimate objective of the guidance is to help USAID achieve integrated impacts related to increased food production, reduced biodiversity loss, reduced greenhouse gas emissions, and increased resilient and inclusive economic growth. Accordingly, USAID tasked the ProLand team to review the evidence-based literature to develop recommendations for promoting sustainable woodfuel production. Prepared for the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) contract number AID-OAA-I-13-00058/AID-OAA-TO-14-00050, Productive Landscapes (ProLand), under the Restoring the Environment through Prosperity, Livelihoods, and Conserving Ecosystems (REPLACE) Indefinite Delivery Indefinite Quantity Contract. This report was produced by ProLand team member David Miller, with contributions from ProLand COP Mark Donahue. Tetra Tech Contacts: Mark Donahue, Chief of Party Mark.Donahue@tetratech.com Ed Harvey, Project Manager Ed.Harvey@tetratech.com Tetra Tech 159 Bank Street, Suite 300, Burlington, VT 05401 Tel: (802) 495-0282, Fax 802 658-4247 www.tetratechintdev.com Cover Photo: Coppice from live stump, Haiti. Photo by Glenn Smucker PRODUCTIVE LANDSCAPES (PROLAND) PROMOTING SUSTAINABLE WOODFUEL SYSTEMS: A REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR PROGRAM DESIGN JULY 2021 DISCLAIMER The author’s views expressed in this publication do not necessarily reflect the views of the United States Agency for International Development or the United States Government. TABLE OF CONTENTS TABLE OF CONTENTS............................................................................................................i ACRONYMS AND ABBREVIATIONS.....................................................................................ii PREFACE ..................................................................................................................................iii 1.0 PURPOSE, SCOPE, ORGANIZATION, METHODS, AND THE LIMITS OF OUR UNDERSTANDING...........................................................................................................1 2.0 THE WAYS WOODFUEL IMPACTS FORESTS .............................................................3 2.1 The Sources of Woodfuel ............................................................................................................................. 3 2.2 The Impact of Harvesting Regimes.............................................................................................................. 4 3.0 THE FOUR COMPONENTS OF AN INTEGRATED APPROACH TO PROMOTING INCLUSIVE, SUSTAINABLE WOODFUEL MARKETS ..................................................6 3.1 Component One: Government-Led Reforestation................................................................................. 6 3.1.1 Challenges to National Reforestation Campaigns....................................................................... 7 3.2 Component Two: National Government Regulation of Woodfuel .................................................... 8 3.2.1 The Unsuccessful Regulation of this Challenging Sector Forestalls Formalization, and Biases Larger Actors........................................................................................................................... 8 3.2.2 Recommendations for Providing Support to Improve Woodfuel Regulation..................... 11 3.3 Component Three: Strengthening Local Governance of Woodfuel Production........................... 12 3.3.1 Challenges to Strengthening Local Governance of Woodfuel Production.......................... 12 3.3.2 Recommendations for Strengthening Local Governance of Woodfuel................................ 15 3.4 Component Four: Fostering Woodfuel Production by Smallholders............................................... 16 3.4.1 Challenges to Creating Conditions that Support Smallholder Tree Cultivation................ 18 3.4.2 Recommendations towards Fostering Sustainable, Inclusive Woodfuel Production and Sale ........................................................................................................................................................ 18 4.0 CROSS-COMPONENT RECOMMENDATIONS FOR DESIGNING WOODFUEL INVESTMENTS................................................................................................................21 4.1 Overarching Recommendations for the Design of Integrated Sustainable Woodfuel Programs... 21 4.2 Considerations for Deciding the Level of Effort to Invest................................................................... 21 4.3 Topics to be Assessed Prior to Program Design................................................................................... 22 REFERENCES..........................................................................................................................24 ANNEX I: ABSTRACT OF THE PROLAND WOODFUEL CASE STUDIES......................32 ANNEX II: DOCUMENTS PROVIDING KEY INFORMATION OR PRACTICAL GUIDANCE, LISTED BY COMPONENT .......................................................................34 PROLAND: PROMOTING SUSTAINABLE WOODFUEL SYSTEMS: A REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR PROGRAM DESIGN i ACRONYMS AND ABBREVIATIONS BME Bureau of Mines and Energy CBFM Community-Based Forest Management CIAT International Center for Tropical Agriculture DENR Department of Environment and Natural Resource ESMAP Energy Sector Management Assistance Program FAO United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization FMU Forest Management Unit FRA Forest Replacement Associations GIZ Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit IEA International Energy Agency IEMS Inclusive Entrepreneurial Market Systems IPCC Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change IUCN International Union for Conservation of Nature Mha Million Hectares MEDD Ministry of Environment and Sustainable Development NNNP North Negros Natural Park NPPFRDC Ngan, Panansalan, Pagsabangan Forest Resources Development Cooperative NYDF New York Declaration on Forests ProLand USAID Productive Landscapes Project USAID United States Agency for International Development WB World Bank YISEDA Young Innovators for Social and Environmental Development Association PROLAND: PROMOTING SUSTAINABLE WOODFUEL SYSTEMS: A REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR PROGRAM DESIGN ii PREFACE Countries dependent on woodfuel recognize the threat this energy source represents to their forests. In areas of high demand such as around urban centers, overharvesting trees for fuel can damage forests and lead to deforestation. Governments work to reduce demand through attempts to transition users to other energy sources, and they invest in technologies to transform and burn woodfuel more efficiently. They complement these efforts with programs to protect natural forests and increase overall tree cover. Governments also undertake afforestation campaigns, regulate the forest sector, and strengthen local forest stewardship. Less directly, governments influence the woodfuel sector by altering the agricultural context and business climate for smallholder tree cultivation. These four components of a sustainable woodfuel program can reinforce each other. Government-led reforestation campaigns generate political will and popular awareness, while efficient and equitable regulation controls overharvesting and supports inclusive markets. Decentralizing forest management empowers and engages local communities, while enabling smallholder tree cultivation creates a sustainable alternative to wood harvested from natural forests. In this paper, we describe each of these components and the considerable challenges governments face implementing them, and offer recommendations for addressing those constraints. We give special attention to the growing trend of smallholder tree cultivation, which plays a critical role in enabling inclusive and sustainable woodfuel markets. PROLAND: PROMOTING SUSTAINABLE WOODFUEL SYSTEMS: A REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR PROGRAM DESIGN iii 1.0 PURPOSE, SCOPE, ORGANIZATION, METHODS, AND THE LIMITS OF OUR UNDERSTANDING Governments and the international development community are increasingly concerned about the impact of woodfuel harvesting on forests (Arnold et al., 2006; Sola et al., 2017; FAO, 2017). Forests play a critical role in sustaining the world’s biodiversity, mitigating climate change, and supporting global economic growth. Overharvesting for woodfuel can diminish these benefits and, in extreme cases, destroy forests. Improved woodfuel management supports international environmental goals, is an element of landscape revitalization efforts such as the Bonn Challenge, and contributes to global efforts to reduce forest carbon emissions. Donors and governments also see woodfuel as a potential driver of rural development and income generation (Smith et al., 2019). This paper aims to assist development practitioners to strengthen programming intended to reduce the environmental impact of woodfuel harvesting. It provides an overview of the woodfuel sector and four components of sustainable woodfuel programming, lists common challenges facing the sector, and includes recommendations intended to orient national-level programming. This study focuses on the sustainable production of woodfuel. It provides only limited information on other topics related to woodfuel such as: the impact of woodfuel use on health; income impacts from woodfuel sales; and the sale, transformation, transportation, and marketing of woodfuel. Nor does it focus on the important topic of the marginalized role of women in the sector, or the introduction of alternatives to woodfuel. For information about clearing forests for agriculture, an important source of Women bear a woodfuel burden Of the 850 million people engaged in the arduous tasks of collecting fuelwood or producing charcoal, about 83 percent are women (FAO, 2018). Cooking with woodfuel, which produces various airborne toxins, also damages the health of women more frequently than men. woodfuel in many countries, see ProLand's Agriculture's Footprint: Designing Investment in Agricultural Landscapes to Mitigate Tropical Deforestation report. This paper begins with a description of woodfuel sources, and the impacts on forests associated with them. The chapters that follow describe four interrelated components of a sustainable woodfuel program and present the challenges faced in the application of each. They also illustrate challenges to decentralizing national woodfuel management through two “mini-case studies” describing efforts in Burkina Faso and the Philippines. The final chapter offers recommendations for government and donor investment to promote the sustainable production of woodfuel. Annex I provides abstracts and links to woodfuel case studies ProLand conducted in Senegal, Madagascar, and Haiti. These cases illustrate the points made in this paper and provide the basis for many of our recommendations. The Madagascar study describes the factors that influence the sustainability of woodfuel sourcing at national and regional scales. The Senegal study chronicles the regulatory challenges the country faces in the transition to increased local management of forests producing woodfuel. The Haiti case study focuses on the factors that influence smallholder tree cultivation. Annex II presents an annotated list of tools useful in the design of programs to promote sustainable woodfuel markets. This document draws on a review of recent scientific literature and selected development literature. While we have used the best information available, additional research could increase the confidence of our claims. Despite the increase in research on woodfuel since 2000, gaps remain regarding the PROLAND: PROMOTING SUSTAINABLE WOODFUEL SYSTEMS: A REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR PROGRAM DESIGN 1 institutions and behaviors that provide the requisite controls and incentives in the woodfuel sector. Speculative prescriptions dominate the development literature, in which claims of success are often made with a few sentences, bullet points or paragraphs. In 2017, Sola et al. (2017) systematically mapped recent peer-reviewed research of the woodfuel value chain in sub-Saharan Africa and found significant weaknesses in the design of almost all the 152 selected studies, concluding that current literature provides a “weak and geographically limited evidence base” upon which to develop policy recommendations. Additionally, some technical questions at the core of woodfuel harvesting remain unanswered, such as the impacts of different harvesting plans and regeneration rates in different forest types. Other topics addressed in our study require research on adjacent subjects. For example, a complete understanding of the incentives for field tree cultivation would require targeted research on non-market drivers, such as associated benefits to agricultural production, which is currently missing in the literature as noted by Mendum and Njenga (2018). The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC, 2019b) concluded that, overall, much remains to be learned concerning the traditional biomass sector, including woodfuel. PROLAND: PROMOTING SUSTAINABLE WOODFUEL SYSTEMS: A REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR PROGRAM DESIGN 2 2.0 THE WAYS WOODFUEL IMPACTS FORESTS Governments, the development community, and researchers have long debated the role of woodfuel production on forest health. The absence of credible information regarding the impact of harvesting has allowed for large shifts in the attention given to this sector. Periods of limited concern may be attributable to the belief that dependence on woodfuel as an energy source does little damage to forests. Properly managed, woodfuel can be a sustainable source of energy (Neufeldt et al., 2015). Woodlands in many countries can eventually regenerate the biomass and biodiversity lost from tree harvesting, although that may take 30 years (Chidumayo & Gumbo, 2013; Woollen et al., 2016; Doggart & Meshack, 2017). More recently, attention has returned to woodfuel harvesting because the threat it poses to forest health has become clear. In 2019, the IPCC concluded that national dependence on woodfuel for energy causes high land and climate impacts (IPCC, 2019b). Demand has increased as urban populations continue to grow and expected shifts to alternative energies have not occurred (see the “What constrains the transition to other energy sources?” text box). Recent projections find that woodfuel harvesting will result in long-term forest degradation (Santos et al., 2017). Even though woodfuel harvesting for fuel rarely causes deforestation, and when it does, the impact is localized (Chidumayo & Gumbo, 2013; Bailis et al., 2015; Masera et al., 2015; FAO, 2017; Santos et al., 2017), harvesting woodfuel is among the most significant causes of degradation in the world’s forests (New York Declaration on Forests [NYDF] Assessment Partners, 2019). What constrains the transition to other energy sources? Continued dependence on woodfuel is commonly associated with rapid population growth, low incomes, limited access and unreliable supply of other sources of energy, and a constrained capacity to generate more electricity. Consumer preference also plays a role; many households continue to cook with woodfuel even as other options are available. This paper gives most attention to one segment of the market, charcoal production for urban populations, because it both contributes the most to the creation of hotspots of forest loss and provides opportunities for intervention since it is geographically concentrated and more closely regulated than rural consumption patterns. Charcoal commoditization provides opportunities to use inclusive market system approaches to increase income generation. We focus primarily on woodfuel systems in Africa because the continent contains countries with some of the hottest hotspots and greatest woodfuel energy deficits. 2.1 THE SOURCES OF WOODFUEL The 2019 IPCC Special Report on Climate Change and Land notes that woodfuel use impacts forests differently depending on the process through which it is produced. The strength of demand and the harvesting regime determine the impact of woodfuel harvesting on forests. Land type, local climate, and initial carbon stocks also play a role Woodfuel emissions Approximately 30% of woodfuel consumed exceeds rates of regrowth. This unsustainable portion emits an estimated 1–2.4 Gt of CO2e annually and contributes 2 to 7 percent of global anthropogenic emissions (Bailis et al., 2015; FAO, 2016b). (IPCC, 2019a). Below we provide an overview of supply sources and demand, and how the manner and timing of harvesting impact forests differently. PROLAND: PROMOTING SUSTAINABLE WOODFUEL SYSTEMS: A REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR PROGRAM DESIGN 3 Forests. By far the greatest portion of woodfuel is harvested from forests whose trees have regrown naturally after being cleared. Primary forest also provides woodfuel, but these forests tend to be more remote, and better protected. Plantations. A much smaller portion of woodfuel comes from trees that have been planted. China, India, and Brazil harvest a growing portion of their woodfuel from trees planted in monocrop plantations. Brazil has established more than 4Mha of large Area in plantations (ha) • Zambia: 52,000 • DRC: 58,000 • Kenya: 153,000 • Madagascar: 312,000 • Uganda: 465,000 • Tanzania: 553,000 • Ethiopia: over a million • Sub-Saharan Africa average: 196,000 (FAO, 2020) scale charcoal producing Eucalyptus plantations (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit [GIZ], 2015). While growth led by these countries increased the area of global planted forest by more than 30 percent between 2000 and 2017, plantations still represent only 7 percent of all forested land (World Bioenergy Association, 2019). Africa sources a much smaller proportion of its woodfuel from planted trees, less than 5 percent (Drigo et al., 2014; Sepp et al., 2014; FAO, 2017). In East Africa, where the largest plantations are found, governments and donors have been reducing funding in plantations since the beginning of this century, leading to a slow decline in their economic sustainability. See the ProLand Madagascar case study (Miller et al., 2021) for a description of woodfuel production on plantations in one country. Agricultural lands. People also harvest and sell wood from trees planted in small woodlots, orchards, field boundaries and pastures. In Senegal, non-forest woodfuel sources include relatively stable parklands with a 5 to 10 percent tree cover and extensive orchards in peri-urban areas (Herrmann et al., 2013). In rare cases, woodfuel markets depend on trees cultivated on agricultural lands. Smallholder farmers produce over 90 percent of Haiti’s domestically sourced energy (International Energy Agency [IEA], 2020; Bureau of Mines and Energy [BME], 2005). Clearing land for agriculture. In some contexts, land-use change produces significant amounts of woodfuel.1 Countries with large forest areas derive a greater percentage of their woodfuel as a byproduct of land clearing and logging. Given accessible markets, woodfuel produced through land clearing may enter commercial streams and generate income. In this case, woodfuel demand is not the primary driver. Its sale does not stimulate additional logging or forest clearing (Drigo et al., 2014; FAO, 2017). Minor sources that provide woodfuel as a byproduct include remnants, chips, or pulp produced during timber processing (Drigo et al., 2014; FAO, 2017). 2.2 THE IMPACT OF HARVESTING REGIMES Intensity, methods, and the tree selection criteria. These three factors may determine whether harvesting results in regeneration, degradation, or deforestation. Distance to forests plays a role in the frequency and extent of harvesting. Because woodfuel is a bulky, low value commodity, transportation costs strongly influence economic returns. Poor or costly transportation networks create pressure to harvest from nearby forests. As a result, supply zones typically expand outwards from urban centers over time as closer sources are exhausted. 1 This potential for land-use change to generate woodfuel explains much of the uncertainty in estimates of woodfuel supplies, as there is no reliable data regarding proportions of cleared trees that are converted to woodfuel. PROLAND: PROMOTING SUSTAINABLE WOODFUEL SYSTEMS: A REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR PROGRAM DESIGN 4 In rural areas with a low population density, harvesting for domestic use has little impact, especially when the wood is primarily collected from dead trees and fallen branches. Conversely, commercial operations more frequently harvest large portions of forests, and lead to slow regrowth rates and impaired ecosystem services. Charcoal, the most commercialized form of woodfuel, is widely associated with intensive harvesting and land degradation (IPCC, 2019b). In parts of eastern and southern Africa, prolonged and frequent harvesting of a high percentage of trees for charcoal has transformed areas of The potential to reverse charcoal’s damage to Zambia’s forests Growth of urban populations has produced a 45-fold increase in the demand for charcoal in Zambia since 1969. This demand spike in turn drove a ten-fold increase in degraded forest area (Ziba & Grouwels, 2017). The damage is not necessarily permanent everywhere. Biodiversity eventually returns to the country’s miombo forests after harvesting has been discontinued (Dlamini et al., 2016). Carbon stocks recover after 20 years (Kalaba et al., 2013). woodlands to scrub lands (Chidumayo & Gumbo, 2013). Urban markets for charcoal contribute strongly to modeling projecting overharvesting in the future (Santos et al., 2017; Bailis et al., 2017). Some commercial charcoal producers clear-cut. This removal of all trees clearly destroys forests. In Africa, clear-cutting appears to be more widespread in east and southern Africa. In West Africa, selective harvesting may be more prevalent (Chidumayo & Gumbo, 2013). In certain regions, charcoal enterprises exclusively harvest hardwoods because they result in a higher quality product. This selective harvesting for woodfuel, if it is continuous, alters forest composition and impairs forest ecosystem functions, resiliency, and productivity (Bailis et al., 2015; FAO, 2016a). Woodfuel may also be harvested through coppicing, which entails cutting trees back at ground level. Here too, the regime makes a difference. Harvesting trees of the right size at the right height for their species may greatly increase regrowth rates (Syampungani et al., 2017). TABLE 2.1: SOURCES OF WOODFUEL BY TREE ORIGIN AND SCALE OF MANAGEMENT TREE ORIGIN NATURAL REGROWTH HOUSEHOLD Primary forest cleared for agriculture Fallow, field trees, coppiced fallow COMMUNITY Primary forest managed or owned by communities Secondary forest managed or owned by communities, enclosures NATIONAL Primary forest in protected areas and concessions Secondary forest in protected areas and concessions PLANTED MANAGEMENT SCALEOrchards, woodlots, hedges, windbreaks, perennial crops Community woodlot Reforestation programs PROLAND: PROMOTING SUSTAINABLE WOODFUEL SYSTEMS: A REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR PROGRAM DESIGN 5 3.0 THE FOUR COMPONENTS OF AN INTEGRATED APPROACH TO PROMOTING INCLUSIVE, SUSTAINABLE WOODFUEL MARKETS Sustainable woodfuel programs require long-term investments that integrate complementary approaches. Governments promote sustainable woodfuel production through: afforestation campaigns; forest sector regulation; decentralization of forest management; and actions altering the agricultural context and business climate for smallholder tree cultivation. Government-led reforestation campaigns generate political will and raise popular awareness, while efficient and equitable regulation controls overharvesting and supports inclusive markets. Decentralizing forest management empowers and engages local communities, while enabling smallholder tree cultivation creates a sustainable alternative to wood harvested from natural forests. Despite the potential of the growing trend in smallholder tree cultivation, reforestation and afforestation do not substitute for protecting forest. Natural forests support substantially greater levels of biodiversity than lands where trees have been planted, and on average store 40 times more carbon than plantations, and 6 times more carbon than agroforestry (Chamshama & Nwonwu, 2004; NYDF Assessment Partners, 2019). Nor does progress in reforestation necessarily slow loss of natural forest, as shown in Vietnam (Kull et al., 2019). Governments and their partners need to attend to all four of the components to successfully promote sustainable and inclusive woodfuel markets. 3.1 COMPONENT ONE: GOVERNMENT-LED REFORESTATION Efforts to increase woodfuel supply fit naturally within national-led campaigns to increase the regrowth and cultivation of trees. Throughout modern history, governments have undertaken large-scale tree cover restoration campaigns to increase timber supply, provide ecosystem services, and combat erosion or flooding. To achieve their goals, governments may use compulsory measures such as land expropriation, or implement incentive programs that rely on payments or other benefits, such as rights in land. The campaigns may promote regrowth in forests, monoculture plantations, or trees on agricultural lands. While few campaigns focus on the woodfuel market, they all contribute to woodfuel supply. Between 1953 and 2007, South Korea expanded forest cover from 35 percent to 64 percent of the country’s total area. Between 1940 and 2010, Puerto Rico raised its forest cover from 6 percent to 60 percent of the island. Sweden and Costa Factors behind progress in El Salvador • El Salvador restored 122,000 hectares of forest between 2014 and 2018. Key factors in making the political will for reforestation a reality were: • Participatory planning process from the beginning • Restoration goals integrated into strategies, policies, and laws across ministries and at all levels of government • A National Monitoring Plan (NYDF Assessment Partners, 2019) Rica have also experienced large-scale restoration (Hanson et al., 2015). Large scale government-led reforestation programs have most often demonstrated success where strong centralized governments target specific, urgent needs, such as reducing soil erosion or meeting the demand for commercial timber. Addressing these challenges of national importance often requires dramatic reforms of forest policies and increased investment of government PROLAND: PROMOTING SUSTAINABLE WOODFUEL SYSTEMS: A REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR PROGRAM DESIGN 6 resources over a long time period. Successful campaigns require organized, thorough, and persistent effort. They also require a systematic approach to land resource management, and effective local and national reward systems (Mansourian et al., 2017; Stanturf et al., 2019). China launched the large-scale “Grain for Green” program to address flooding and soil erosion and increased forest cover by 9.5 million hectares (Mha) between 2000 and 2010, primarily through afforestation with timber species on erosion-prone mountainous terrain and barren lands. The PRC Government motivated farmers to participate in the voluntary program by providing seedlings, grain subsidies, and annual cash stipends, in addition to forest land-use rights certificates. Vietnam increased forest cover by 2.5 Mha over the same period, largely through state timber plantations (NYDF Assessment Partners, 2019; Rudel et al., 2020). Countries collaborating on the Bonn Challenge take a variety of approaches to promote reforestation. The campaigns are as varied as the countries that undertake them, targeting cocoa agroforestry systems (Ghana); financing small-scale farmers (Rwanda); assisting natural regeneration (Burkina Faso); and restoring degraded mangrove areas (Vietnam, Thailand, Indonesia).2 As of 2019, 13 countries expressed commitments to restore 44 Mha, principally through silviculture and natural regeneration on degraded forest lands, and agroforestry on agricultural lands. A small percentage are supporting commercial plantations to restore degraded lands (Dave et al., 2019). 3.1.1 Challenges to National Reforestation Campaigns Countries where governments have invested fewer resources over less time have not seen an enduring change in tree cover. African plantation programs of the 1970s and 1980s designed to provide woodfuel for urban centers rarely proved sustainable, and when donor funding dried up activities were discontinued and production gradually deteriorated on the unmaintained woodlots and plantations. Ethiopia established as many as 40,000 hectares of energy plantations between 1975 and 1994 in peri urban areas that were neither maintained nor expanded upon (Chamshama & Nwonwu, 2004). Projects promoting community-level plantations elsewhere in Africa over the same period faced similar challenges, and similar fates. Parallel to planting campaigns, woodfuel harvested from natural forests continued to be sold at prices that undermined the economic viability of plantations established by governments, while poor management, lack of technical expertise, and conflicts over land also proved detrimental (Hofstad et al., 2009; Chidumayo & Gumbo, 2013; GIZ, 2015). In the 1970s and 1980s, over approximately 12 years, the Government of the Republic of Niger, supported by international development agencies, implemented projects that planted 60 million trees. The effort is often considered a success, yet less than half of the planted trees survived (Hanson et al., 2015). Despite global commitments and apparent governmental will, countries that have taken up the Bonn Challenge have fallen short of their targets. Even Challenges to landscape restoration The Madagascar 2017 National Strategy for Forest Landscape Restoration and Green Infrastructure identifies four primary challenges to landscape restoration that may hinder the afforestation initiative: 1) weak management by the national government; 2) a lack of local governance capacity; 3) a shortage of technical skill; and 4) a lack of national and international financial support (Ministère de l'Environnement et du Développement Durable [MEDD], 2017). El Salvador, one of the most successful countries, has met only 12 percent of its restoration pledge (see “Factors behind progress in El Salvador” text box). Overall rates of reforestation in participating countries have slowed over the past decade (NYDF Assessment Partners, 2019). Critics argue that restoration takes too long, costs too much, and produces too few benefits to justify public or private expenditures (Stanturf et al., 2019). Successful campaigns require more political will and resources than many 2 More information on all these efforts and those of other countries may be found at the Bonn Challenge website and the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Bonn Challenge portal. PROLAND: PROMOTING SUSTAINABLE WOODFUEL SYSTEMS: A REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR PROGRAM DESIGN 7 governments can dedicate. They are weakened by competing interests and conflict between prioritizing livelihoods versus biodiversity (Dave et al., 2017). Whether undertaken as one component of a restoration campaign, or designed exclusively to increase the availability of woodfuel, sustainable and substantial growth in woodfuel production at a national scale requires a supportive policy and regulatory context, the engagement of local stakeholders, and a vibrant and inclusive market for smallholder-produced woodfuel. The following sections provide background and recommendations for the implementation of these three complementary components of an integrated woodfuel program. 3.2 COMPONENT TWO: NATIONAL GOVERNMENT REGULATION OF WOODFUEL Management of the woodfuel sector naturally falls under the much larger domain of forest policy. Woodfuel regulation typically focuses on the protection of natural forests through restrictions on the location, methods, and frequency of harvesting. It may also limit production through controls on transformation, transportation, storage, and sales. Common policy tools governments use to achieve these objectives include harvesting plans, licenses and permits. They may also require permits and assess fees higher up the supply chain to enforce standards for the transport, transformation, storage, and sale of woodfuel. Ideally, policymakers base woodfuel policies on forest and supply chain monitoring. The revenue generated through regulations may become an important source of revenue for the forest service. 3.2.1 The Unsuccessful Regulation of this Challenging Sector Forestalls Formalization, and Biases Larger Actors Governments in the developing world have difficulty fostering sustainable, equitable, transparent, and efficient woodfuel markets (de Miranda et al., 2010; Blundo, 2011; Zulu & Richardson, 2013; Schure et al., 2013; Sepp et al., 2014; Iiyama et al., 2015; Faye & Ribot, 2017). The sector is perhaps most challenged in Africa, but these challenges are not unheard of elsewhere, as evidenced by recent studies of corruption and elite control in the woodfuel value chain in Peru and the Philippines (Bennett et al., 2018; Pulhin & Ramirez, 2016). Barriers to better policy • Policymakers assume woodfuel is an underlying cause of forest degradation and deforestation • International initiatives fail to recognize the importance of wood energy as part of the energy mix • Policy makers regard woodfuel energy as “primitive” or “backward,” and promote unattainable alternative “modern” energy sources • Reliable forest sector data is unavailable and does not inform government policies and strategies (World Bank [WB], 2013) Three characteristics common to woodfuel markets make this sector particularly difficult to regulate: 1) They are complex, as woodfuel comes from multiple sources of different scales and types; 2) They are geographically diffuse, as woodfuel comes from large geographic zones that reach into remote areas; and 3) They are informal, as the woodfuel value chain receives little capital investment and is dominated by person-to-person transactions (Sepp et al., 2014). These characteristics of the sector, combined African NDCs shortchange woodfuel When African countries have expressed their commitments to reduce national emissions and adapt to the impacts of climate change in their Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) they have given little weight to the woodfuel sector. NDCs commonly suggest woodfuel is a “backwater technology,” gloss over specifics, and fail to identify institutional responsibilities (Amugune et al., 2017). PROLAND: PROMOTING SUSTAINABLE WOODFUEL SYSTEMS: A REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR PROGRAM DESIGN 8 with other common constraints on woodfuel sector policies (see: “Barriers to better policy” text box), regularly lead governments to: 1) develop incomplete, coercive policies that suppresses economic activity and 2) improperly and incompletely administer policies, which leads to overharvesting and market concentration. Incomplete, coercive policies that suppress economic activity. National policy frameworks for woodfuel are often a low priority, poorly developed, and rely on penalties more often than incentives. Successful policy innovation: woodfuel replacement Begun in Brazil in the 1980s, Forest Replacement Associations (FRAs) contract farmers to grow trees to replace woodfuel consumption by businesses. Key elements: • Law requires businesses to replace the wood they consume. • To meet this requirement, businesses pay a fee to a local FRA, which contracts with farmers to produce trees. The government monitors the process. • The FRA provides seedlings to local farmers. It may also provide technical assistance, fertilizer, pesticides, or fencing materials. • Farmers own the trees, but agree to give the participating business first refusal when the wood is sold. • Farmers may be required to meet conditions, such as dedicating a specific area to trees, or a percentage to native fruit and wood species. • FRAs function less well at a distance from wood-consuming businesses and where there is less available land that is unsuitable for agriculture, but suitable for tree crops. (Source: WB, 2013; GIZ, 2015). Governments treat woodfuel as a sector of lesser importance and invest insufficient resources to developing policies. Forestry may be the most natural “home” for woodfuel regulation, but policy in this sector often focuses exclusively on regulating the timber industry. Policy regarding the use of forest products focuses on logging concessions and their administration, while policy regarding trade in forest products focuses on roundwood. Rather than developing unified coherent legislation for woodfuel, governments tend to address it piecemeal and across multiple sectors. Rules that impact the production and marketing of woodfuel may be found in legislation concerning forestry, agriculture, environment, local government, land law, commerce, and other sectors. In Africa, rules that address woodfuel most often appear within the laws codifying the management of decentralized forests (Kohler & Schmithüsen, 2004). Many of the governments with an overall woodfuel strategy, such as Zambia, Cameroon, Malawi, Democtratic Republic of Congo, and Kenya, have rules regarding woodfuel in the legislation of multiple sectors (Sola et al., 2019). Legislation regarding charcoal generally receives even less attention than does woodfuel. As of 2006, in East Africa, only Kenya and Northern Sudan specifically addressed charcoal in policy (Mugo & Ong, 2006). Because they are conceived independently and at different times, the various rules often overlap, conflict, and are incomplete or unclear (WB, 2011a; Schure et al., 2013; Iiyama et al., 2015; Neufeldt et al., 2015; Sola et al., 2019). Malawi is one of the few countries in Africa with a comprehensive charcoal strategy. (See “One country with a charcoal strategy” text box.) The poorly developed policies that One country with a charcoal strategy The Malawi National Charcoal Strategy promotes fuel efficient cooking; improved collection and dissemination of information; better enforcement and regulation; and the cultivation of fast-growing tree species through concessions to large-scale commercial interests and on degraded government plantation land, in combination with smallholder out-growers producing on marginal lands or homesteads (Republic of Malawi, n.d.). governments promulgate tend to rely on coercive powers. They rarely include incentives to improve forest stewardship or promote reforestation or afforestation, such as tax incentives, payments for environmental services, cost sharing, or improved access to markets (Sepp et al., 2014; Smith et al., 2019). The punitive measures at their core, such as taxes, fines, and permits, are designed to control behavior and dampen economic activity (WB, 2011a; Sola et al., 2019). As a result, they do not exploit PROLAND: PROMOTING SUSTAINABLE WOODFUEL SYSTEMS: A REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR PROGRAM DESIGN 9 the sector’s potential to provide broad-based incomes and economic development in rural areas (Iiyama et al., 2017). Incomplete and improper administration of poorly developed policies leads to overharvesting and market concentration. Governments complement lax policy development with underfunded implementation. The forestry services tasked with administration are strapped for resources: too few field agents allotted too few vehicles monitor remote forests ineffectively, review harvesting plans inadequately, and administer systems of permits and fines ineffectively and inequitably. Rather than working in forests, agents are often posted in easy-to-access locations, such as transportation routes and markets (United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization [FAO], 2014). Beyond the reach of the forest service, value chain actors reuse permits, or do not make the effort to obtain or update them. Transporters evade regulation by driving at night or on unregulated routes. Actors all along the value chain rely on bribes when they get caught (Hofstad et al., 2009; de Miranda et al., 2010; Schure et al., 2013; Neufeldt et al., 2015; Iiyama et al., 2015). This threadbare implementation of poorly developed policy produces perverse consequences. It creates a bias towards larger actors and enables corrupt behavior. The administrative burdens of regulation create a bias towards individuals with the know-how, connections, and resources to navigate administrative controls (Neufeldt et. al, 2015). They also push market actors towards the gaps produced by the incomplete coverage, and towards illicit behaviors and unregulated geographies beyond government’s reach. This increases the amount of illicitly produced woodfuel which, by escaping the costs of regulated production, sells at lower prices than regulated woodfuel, thus undercutting the goals of regulation. The continued informal nature of the sector reinforces negative perceptions and decreases the potential for investment from the government and the private sector necessary to develop a more sustainable system (Owen et al., 2013; Doggart & Meshack, 2017; Sola et al., 2019). The ProLand Senegal case study (Miller et al., 2020) presents one country’s experience confronting these and other common regulatory challenges. Mini-case study 1: Burkina Faso, promising local forest management has been hampered by stalled decentralization Burkina Faso may have the oldest locally managed production forests in Africa, created through a woodfuel scheme supported with project funding in the 1980s.. Local associations called Forest Management Units (FMUs) implement forest harvesting plans and provide revenue to workers, local institutions, and the national government. In 2006, an estimated 55,000 people earned income from the value chain. The largely self sustaining FMUs depend on NGOs for capacity building, but otherwise operate independent of project support. Now in their second 20-year rotation, the forests appear to be managed sustainably, if not in perfect accordance with harvesting plans. They provide about one fifth of all woodfuel consumed in the country. The endurance and apparent success of FMUs belies critical limitations to the approach. Local forest management in Burkina Faso has not lived up to the promise of decentralization under which it was initiated. After the creation of the FMUs, the Forest Service increased its role in local forest management and constrained the authority of local management groups. Justified as part of a process to empower local communities, the approach, funded by donors, enabled the Forest Service to extend its control and more thoroughly regulate the FMU forests (Côte & Gautier, 2018). A cadre of urban merchants took advantage of continued management by the national government, widespread corruption, and lacunae and contradictions in the regulatory framework to capture the lion’s share of revenue generated by the value chain. Revisions to the Forest Code in 2011 granted greater community participation, but top-down governance remains the rule (Arevalo, 2016). This is in part due to conflicts among local jurisdictions. In some cases, locally managed forests span several administrative units. This creates conflicts of authority among local governments, traditional governments, and the managers of forest management units (Coulibaly-Lingani et al., 2011). PROLAND: PROMOTING SUSTAINABLE WOODFUEL SYSTEMS: A REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR PROGRAM DESIGN 10 The approach has not spread across the country. When donor support was discontinued, no new FMUs were created. The stalled national process of decentralization and the government’s inability to extend the approach to other areas of the country has left much of the country’s forests unmanaged. The Forest Service and local governments effectively control only a very small portion of the country’s forest; today, most of the woodfuel consumed in Burkina Faso continues to be harvested illegally, outside of managed forests. This mini-case study is based on common findings in the following articles, with only exceptions cited above: (Coulibaly-Lingani et al., 2011; Sawadogo & Tiveau, 2011; Bouda et al., 2011; Arevalo, 2016; Côte & Gautier, 2018; Foli et al., 2018). 3.2.2 Recommendations for Providing Support to Improve Woodfuel Regulation3 Over the long term, broad improvement in governance may provide the foundation for progress towards sustainable and inclusive woodfuel markets. Analysis of data across 45 sub-Saharan countries suggests that deforestation driven by commercial woodfuel systems can be reduced by improving governmental effectiveness and controlling corruption (Sulaiman et al., 2017). Recommendations for more targeted programs follow. Strengthen the policy context: • Address stigma associated with woodfuel and highlight the sector’s importance as a potential source of revenue and income generation. • Conduct cross-sectoral studies on woodfuel policy to identify gaps and conflicts in regulation. • Support coherence in the development of woodfuel policies, and support their harmonization with policy in other sectors. • Integrate support for tree planting and plantations into overall forest policy. Support effective policy: • Explore creating regulatory incentives to counterbalance punitive measures. Examples include differentiated taxation systems that impose tax only on wood sourced from non-managed areas other than private land; and payments for ecosystem services schemes providing payments to landholders who invest in sustainable woodfuel production. • Promote scalable policy reforms that pose achievable resource demands on the national government; can be adopted at the local level without ongoing financial support; and depend on local knowledge and expertise or persons hired by local communities. • Develop flexibility in the legal and regulatory framework to accommodate local community, forest, and market characteristics. Technical and administrative requirements should be Tools to support transparency Transparency International’s INDEPENDENT REDD+ GOVERNANCE MONITORING provides civil society organizations and practitioners involved in tackling REDD+ corruption and governance issues an overview of key considerations for the design and implementation of effective independent governance monitoring systems. Transparency International and United Nations Human Settlement Programme’s Tools to Support Transparency in Local Governance provides a collection of practical tools that civil society organizations and other advocacy groups can use in their efforts to promote accountable and responsive local governments. 3 These recommendations draw from Schure et al. (2013); FAO (2004); FAO (2017); de Miranda et al. (2010); WB (2011a); and Smith et al. (2019). The ProLand Senegal, Madagascar, and Haiti case studies also provide a basis for these recommendations, some of which are discussed at greater length in those documents. PROLAND: PROMOTING SUSTAINABLE WOODFUEL SYSTEMS: A REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR PROGRAM DESIGN 11 adaptable to the capacity and needs of communities managing small forests and commercial enterprises working larger areas. • Support low-cost systems of improved monitoring for woodfuel harvesting and the value chain. Improve implementation of regulations: • Invest in institutional practices and staff capacity development to create accountability mechanisms. • Institutionalize transparency and ease of public monitoring through such measures as: – campaigns to increase awareness of laws and regulations; – public decision-making; – public presentation of results of monitoring, and posting of harvesting and transportation permits allotted; and – the creation of accessible procedures for seeking recourse (see: “Tools to support trans