On The Ground in Malawi: Deforestation

A common problem in protected areas

The smell of Africa. For many Africa-addicted travellers, the warm scent of smoke hovering over villages is a symbol for the continent they have learned to love so much. 

At the same time, this beloved smell bears the message of one of Africa’s greatest environmental problems: in Africa, deforestation is, for a large part, due to households’ need for firewood. As the populations grow and forests shrink, new solutions have to be found - for the sake of both nature and people.

More forests felled than growing

Most of the original wildlife of Malawi has given way to the needs of a growing population. This is also true about for the forests, which have shrunk to less than a half the size of the original area. In the 1970’s, there were 4.4 million hectares of forests in Malawi. Today, less than 2 million hectares remain.

The current deforestation rate of Malawi is 3.5 % - meaning that this much of the remaining forests vanish annually.

Fuel briquettes - a solution?

The main reason for deforestation is the need for firewood in households. 90% of Malawians use firewood for cooking. It is therefore clear that the solution to the problem has to be found in the kitchen.

One approach is making fuel briquettes out of organic waste material such as waste paper, grass, leaves, as well as maize (corn) stalks collected from fields after harvesting.