Charcoal out, briquettes in

Mwingi – When local authorities in eastern Kenya slapped a ban on trading charcoal earlier this year in an effort to save the region’s dwindling forests, charcoal producers worried their income would disappear.

“It was a chilling announcement,” said Peninah Kilungya, 42, a mother of five. “We turn to charcoal production so that we can feed our children,” she said.

Rain often fails in this semi-arid area, which makes farming risky. For some people, turning trees into charcoal is an option of last resort to make ends meet. But Kilungya and others may now have found a way to hold on to their charcoal-making income while also protecting trees, building a more sustainable future for themselves.

They have turned to producing wood briquettes from tree branches, reducing the felling of trees, while also making a product they hope could interest supermarkets and help lift hundreds of families out of poverty. The new briquettes use far less wood and produce more income.

On a recent day, in the tiny village of Mitamisyi in Kitui County, Kilungya and other charcoal producers gathered under an acacia tree. They crushed pebbles of charcoal made from tree branches into fine dust with a locally-crafted briquette-making machine, then mixed the powder with fine red soil and water.

The sky-blue machine then spat out elongated and chunky charcoal briquettes that look a bit like burned sausages.

More than 150 charcoal producers have adopted the technique in Kitui County alone. The briquette-making initiative is also ongoing in neighbouring Tharaka Nithi and Embu counties.

Joseph Mwikya, the chairperson of Mitamisyi’s charcoal producers association, said the charcoal used in the briquettes is made from sustainable wood – tree branches that grow back.

Branches can also be crushed easily, unlike tree trunks, and the briquettes made with the wood sell for more, he said.

The regular shape of the product also allows them to be packaged in a way producers hope could appeal to big-city supermarkets.

“All we need is a way of producing them in larger quantities so that we can start marketing them,” said Jane Vengi, the chairperson of the Kitui-based Mwaka Charcoal Producers Association, one of the country’s top charcoal producers.

Scaling up production would require cutting of more branches, but that would still be preferable to more trees being felled, promoters of the project said.

For now, the briquettes are being sold to locals, said Vengi. “These briquettes are now our new source of cooking energy and, hopefully, will be our new source of income in the near future.”

Forests cover about 7% of Kenya’s land area, down from 12% half a century ago.