Biochar, poverty and development: Opportunities, threats, social science

agendas

Melissa LeachPresentation to Biogenic Sequestration of

Carbon Dioxide Workshop 23rd November 2010

Biochar and development – adding to the ‘wins’?

Value now attributed to biochar for soil enhancement, carbon sequestration and clean energy production – a triple win

Also opportunities for development and poverty reduction Realising these opportunities and avoiding risks requires

interdisciplinary research; key agendas for social science Two linked projects:

- ‘Anthropogenic Dark Earths in Africa?’ James Fairhead, Kojo Amanor, Melissa Leach, James Fraser, Johannes Lehmann, West African partners (Anthropologists, historians, archaeologists, soil scientists) – ESRC research grant, 2010 – 2012

- ‘Biochar for the poor?’ ESRC STEPS Centre project, 2010 - 2011

Biochar and smallholder livelihoods: opportunities Improving smallholder agriculture and food security (addressing soil

structure/fertility constraints with low external inputs; improved efficiency of fertilizer use)

Contributing to sustainable land use and management systems (recycling of biomass ‘waste’; long-term soil/vegetation upgrades)

Generating health benefits (improved stoves generate char while reducing indoor air pollution; such small-scale, slow pyrolysis efficient and cost-effective for carbon abatement - Pratt and Moran 2010).

Enabling poorer land users to gain from carbon markets

Growing numbers of pilot projects/trials with small farmers (e.g. WorldStove, TerrAfrica, ProNatura, Biochar Fund, universities, private sector partnerships)

20+ in Africa; (e.g. Biochar Fund in Cameroon & DR Congo creating ‘a synergy that radically changes the livelihoods of some of the world's poorest communities in multiple ways’.)

But also threats Displacement of land use and users by plantations of biochar feedstocks

‘Land grabbing’ and ‘carbon-grabbing’( vocal NGO critics - Biofuelwatch, TNI, African Biodiversity Network, Friend of the Earth – suggest commercial interests working against small farmers)

‘Biochar vs. food’ – echoing ‘Biofuels vs. food’ debate Imposition of external technology that fails to fit smallholders’ real needs, and may have

unintended effects (resource tenure, labour, gender) Questions of scale: large (commercial, plantations) vs. small (locally appropriate, waste-

using)

Much of the debate is increasingly polarised and politicised – not always helpfully

Requiring social science attention Understanding and working with local socio-economic

contexts and priorities Developing socially as well as technically-appropriate

approaches (including participatory and community-based)

Addressing diversity of settings and needs Highlighting uncertainties and potential trade-offs Identifying and contributing to institutional and

governance challenges (including regulation of schemes and financing/carbon markets)

Missing opportunities

Transfer of technology or ‘indigenous’ technology?

Origins of biochar interest and research in Amazonian terra preta; valued and used by today’s smallholders, but knowledge and practices that created it destroyed with European conquest

Possibility that today’s farmers already produce and use biochar and ‘dark earths’ overlooked by researchers (soil science, agronomy, ‘ethnopedology’, biochar projects)

Requiring further interdisciplinary research attention: Local knowledge and practices producing biochar, dark earths and other

carbon-enriched soils in smallholder farming systems

Emerging evidence from Africa1. African terra preta: former settlement sites and

farmingFarmers across the continent value and use the dark

soils of ruined settlement sites, anthropogenically-enriched (including char) through past inhabitants’ practices (intentional and everyday)

Guinea – tombondu – 10-12 sites per village territory, central to farming repertoire, mimicked on ‘unimproved’ land, used for groundnuts and root crops

Liberia - survey has identified terra preta analogues at 148 sites in NW Liberia, with fertile black soils, ceramic fragments, at locations either identified by locals as “old town spots,” or in circular rings around long-inhabited sites. Mainly used for market gardening or as cocoa agroforests (c. 30% of Liberia’s annual cocoa exports on ADE?)

Many further examples – e.g. from Africanist archaeologists

Abandoned compound planted with maize, Mandara Mts, Cameroon

Terra preta at Palala, NW Liberia, planted with maize, okra, cabbage and lettuce

2. Charring vegetation in anaerobic conditions under soil

Many African examples where farmers cut grass or bush vegetation, dry it and cover it with soil, then burn it carefully and slowly (1-2 weeks) ‘without a flame’. Soil, char and ash mix sometimes farmed as it is on the mound, or distributed more widely over the field.

Some (early) agronomic interest; called variously ‘burn-beating’, ‘denshering’, ‘soil burning’, ‘ecobuage’. Always had a bad press, but never investigated for char-related benefitsE.g.

• Guinea: Muki or Moki practices using buried and charred grass root balls, spread to render hard soils cultivable for rice

• Ghana: Example of a single innovative farmer; charring of cut bush fallow under earth, with charred product spread over plots for maize, plantain, cocoyam

• Congo, Gabon: Maala practices of charring grass under soil used to rehabilitate soils degraded and compacted by 1940s mechanisation, rendering them

productive for root and horticultural crops

Labour-intensive, but represent long-term investment that builds up soil char content over successive seasons?

Biochar, development pathways and research agendas• Interdisciplinary (social-natural) science is required to explore existing local

biochar practices, their soil and carbon sequestration effects and potential – a huge under-researched area

• Potential to build on these in pro-poor biochar innovations that suit farmers’ perspectives and priorities

• Diverse biochar innovations and systems will be appropriate to diverse contexts and goals (Lehmann and Joseph 2009)

• Biochar is no panacea for poverty or the problems facing Africa’s smallholders

But• There is potential for relatively small scale, locally appropriate biochar

schemes to link local livelihood needs with contributions to carbon sequestration, as part of diverse portfolios

• Research is required to explore and clarify the social and institutional, as well as technical and economic, conditions for such promise to be realised.

Development gains - adding to biochar ‘wins’?

• Value now attributed to biochar for soil enhancement, carbon sequestration and clean energy production – a so-called ‘triple win’.

• potential contribution to sustainable and equitable land management.