Promoting Smokeless Fuel & Sustainable Incomes for Women
Location: Nyamira County, Kenya
Flicker of Hope, based in Nyamira County, Kenya aims to organize and empower vulnerable rural populations in drought prone areas, with an emphasis on women and children, by helping them to build sustainable livelihoods and to empower the communities to become self-reliant. For this project, the organization will be addressing a number of issues including resource and water scarcity, deforestation, pollution, public health, and the lack of sustainable employment in the area.
Flicker of Hope is partnering with Rockflower to bring smokeless bio-briquettes and cookstoves to the county. This project will reduce deforestation, utilize untapped resources, increase public health, and provide income to rural women who will produce the bio-briquettes. The briquettes are made primarily from brush and bushes, which until now have not been utilized as a resource and also inhibit forest growth.
Nyamira County is an area with very few options for earning a living. The area is prone to crop failure and drought. One of the only consistent resources in the area has been wood from the forests, which are used for fires and building materials. However, the prevalence of deforestation has caused the few watersheds in the area to dry up. Due to a lack of resources, the forest is being destroyed, water is being depleted and the air is becoming polluted from all of the smoke.
Currently, the main sources of fuel are firewood, charcoal and kerosene. The first two produce smoke which is both unhealthy and contributes to pollution, and kerosene is often in short supply. Flicker of Hope has introduced bio-briquettes which solve this problem as they are safe to burn, do not produce smoke and are easily accessible. The main component, brush from bushes, have not been used as a resource in the past. The bushes are abundant, and their presence inhibits forest growth, so removing them aids reforestation. Creating the bio-briquettes will help to restore tree cover and return some of the watersheds that have become dry in recent years.
Additionally, the organization sees this as a self employment opportunity for rural men and women. They will train people on how to collect the brush and provide a consistent source of income to those people. Jobs will also be created through the production of the bio-briquettes as well as through distribution and transportation of the product. The organization will focus on providing jobs to disadvantaged women and girls.
This project aims to solve multiple problems with one simple, innovative solution. Flicker of Hope sees the potential for this product to grow, and to empower more women to gain income, while aiding in public health, reforestation, replenishing watersheds and tapping an underutilized natural resource.
