GLF Bonn 2020
How to feed the world without eating the planet? The 2020 theme of the Global Landscapes Forum (GLF) is “Food and Livelihoods.” Today, food production and agricultural systems are one of the largest sources of greenhouse gas emissions, a main driver of deforestation, and the greatest threat to biodiversity. It’s time to transform this problem into an opportunity.
GLF 2020 is the first environmental digital conference of its kind – with over 300 speakers, hundreds of organizations, 235,000 engagements on social media, 22,000 messages plus 2,500 articles exchanged among participants – highlighted the need for platforms like GLF to continue including the voices of diverse knowledge holders from every corner of the world.
Sustainable wood value chains are contributing to food security in Sub-Saharan Africa
One of the most important contributions of forests to food security is the provision of wood fuel. In Sub-Saharan Africa, 60% of households use wood fuel to cook, boil water, and preserve food. But unsustainable wood fuel production and trade are depleting and degrading forests and trees.
Despite its socio-economic importance, woodfuel production and trade is still a mostly informal sector. It is not organized, it has weak or inadequate legal frameworks, and it contributes little to government revenues.
The lack of woodfuel governance, in combination with increasing demand, results in unsustainable wood harvesting that causes forest degradation and greenhouse gas emissions. In contrast, sustainable woodfuel value chains can positively contribute to livelihoods, by generating both household income from trade and a secure supply of cooking fuel, while mitigating negative environmental impacts.
There is a need for an integrated approach to woodfuel value chain dynamics that considers multiple functions of forest-agricultural landscapes and outcomes for livelihoods and forest governance.
This session provides documented experience on how better practices within woodfuel value chains and related governance can positively transform woodfuel sectors to benefit livelihoods, through both energy supply and income-generating activities, while reducing negative environmental impacts on forest-agricultural landscapes and mitigating climate change.
Check out the GLF Bonn Digital Conference 2020 Outcome Statement.
Originally titled “Sustainable wood-fuel value chains for food security in Sub-Saharan Africa”, this session hosted by CIFOR aired on June 4th, 2020 at the GLF Bonn Digital Conference.
