The Investigation And Analysis Of Fuelwood Excessive Utilization Leading To Deforestation In Comoros Islands

The issue of domestic energy remains a major concern in developing countries. Globally, the majority of the population still uses more firewood, charcoal and agricultural residues to meet their energy needs in cooking fuel. It is estimated that in developing countries, nearly 2.5 billion people rely on fuelwood to meet their daily cooking needs. For many of these countries, more than 90% of the total amount of household fuel is fuelwood. This fuelwood consumption threatens forest ecosystems in the context where access to other alternative energy sources such as kerosene, butane gas, electricity, etc., remain too limited and inaccessible for the majority of households. Indeed, much of the fuelwood consumed by households comes from the forest.In the Comoros Islands, a small archipelago in the Indian Ocean, one of the poorest countries in the world, the energy situation is more worrying. In this country, it is estimated that 78% of national energy consumption comes from wood and it has also been found that much of the fuelwood mainly comes from the forest. The fuelwood remains the main source of domestic energy especially for everyday household cooking. It is estimated that 74% of Comorian households use fuelwood for cooking daily meals. In rural areas, fuelwood remains almost the only source of energy for cooking, and cutting or gathering wood is free. The consumption of purchased fuelwood is only done in urban areas. Thus, the use of this energy source has become massive and unsustainable in the country. This is a concern as it contributes to the degradation of the national forest ecosystem. The consequence of this situation is the gradual deforestation of national forests.It is recognized that the fuelwood consumption contributes to deforestation in many countries in Africa, but unfortunately, this question has not been given far from to have special attention in the Comoros Islands. In many African countries, the energy domain and fuelwood consumption in particular, has already been the subject of some number of studies, but at the level of the Comoros by cons these studies are lacking. The few statistics that will be available on fuelwood are approximate, even disparate summary. To overcome this lack of information we conducted surveys at the riparian households of Karthala forest located on the island of Ngazidja either in the Comoros Islands. This gait is composed as follows:-A survey in the Urban Area (City of Moroni):In order to study the factors that affect the consumption in urban areas, where alternative sources of energy are available, we conducted a survey of fifty households on the consumption of fuelwood in the city of Moroni. The Two Stage Least Squares (2SLS) method was then used for estimation of the coefficients of the simultaneous equation model. Most significant determinants of fuelwood demand in this city are the following:the fuelwood price, kerosene’s price, personal incomes of the household, household size, and the distance between the household and the place of fuelwood sales.-An investigation in local areas and within the forest service:here we have conducted a survey of 147 households in three villages bordering the Karthala forest. To know the behavior of the Forest Service with respect to the protection of forests in general and its role with regard to the consumption of fuelwood, we considered it important to interview some officials of the national Forest Service.In this part of the work, we used the analytical method. This method helped us to identify and analyze the information gathered in the riparian households (rural area) of Karthala forest, and those of the components of the Forest service, and present them in tables and figures. Information from this study will allow us to objectively formulate and implement strategies at all levels. Starting with the user population of fuelwood are households, and the forest service (guarantee forest protection) to slow or stop the abusive use of fuelwood through efficient use of it. Of do this, Microsoft Office Excel 2007 was employed for this analysis. In light of this present study’s findings, recommendations will be made to try to slow the deforestation phenomenon in the country and within the Karthala forest, caused by excessive and inefficient fuelwood use by the households.The results of this study showed the truthfulness of the advanced hypotheses. The socioeconomic conditions of the population are not in favor of a rational use of wood-energy by the waterside households of the Karthala forest. The factors of this anarchy consumption of fuelwood are enormous. It contributes effectively to the degradation of the forest and of its very advanced deforestation.The results of our work will serve to inform the government and the people, but also international organizations:the role of the abusive and uncontrolled use of fuelwood to deforestation in the Comoros Islands and the need for an effective policy of management and sustainable forestry in general, and the fuelwood sector in particular, needs to be considered for national energy policy. In other words, these results will serve as guide to the consumers, forestry managers, policy makers and future researchers.