Fuel efficient stoves boosting education and conserving forests in Taita Hills

Biodiversity rich Taita Hills forests habour plant and animal species not found anywhere else in the world.

It's another beautiful day in the Taita Hills. It is almost lunchtime and students at the Vichwala Primary School are eager to get to the cafeteria for their lunch. The school lunches at Vichwala have become extra special recently - they are now prepared using an energy-saving stove. The stove allows meals to be prepared using less firewood. This means that the students have had to spend less time collecting firewood and can better enjoy their meal and study hours at school.

Statistics from the Ministry of Energy indicate that in Kenya more than 90 percent of rural households use firewood for cooking and heating, and more than 80 per cent of urban households use charcoal.

As a result, forests and woodlands are rapidly being degraded, biodiversity is seriously depleted, and basic ecosystem services are being negatively affected. This is particularly apparent in areas with no formal protection, like the Taita Hills and Dakatcha Woodland.

Most schools do not have woodlots to sustain their feeding programmes and students are asked to bring to school sizeable pieces of firewood every day. In other schools, parents are required to supply firewood at the beginning of the term as part of their contribution to their child's education.

Six schools (called 'Climate Friendly Schools') in the Taita Hills have adopted energy-saving stoves (an initiative being piloted by Nature Kenya in Taita-Taveta and Kilifi counties). Other schools are located within three forest areas - Taita Hills, Dakatcha Woodland and Arabuko- Sokoke Forest (all sites of global biodiversity conservation importance). Schools using energy-saving stoves are likely to significantly benefit the environment in their area.

Easing of firewood consumption

Prior to the installation of the energy-saving stove at Vichwala Primary School, approximately 60 kg of firewood was being used to prepare a single meal for the school's 200 students using traditional 'three-stone' open fire stoves. Today, only 20 kg is used to prepare the same meal. This translates to a 60 per cent reduction in fuelwood consumption!

Open fire stoves used approximately 15 kg of fuelwood to bring 30 litres of water to boil, the energy-saving stoves only used 5kg! The energy-saving stoves also took a shorter time to bring the water to boil and produced less smoke.

Health implications

Cooking with open fire stoves is also associated with high levels of domestic air pollution. These stoves produce harmful pollutants such as fine particles (soot) and carbon monoxide. Statistics from the World Health Organization (WHO) indicate that around 3.8 million people die from exposure to household air pollution every year. The use of energy efficient technologies such as the energy-saving stoves significantly reduces smoke emissions, giving a cleaner cooking environment.

"Our cooks now work in healthier surroundings thanks to the energy-saving stove. This translates to fewer smoke-related respiratory problems and reduced medical costs," says Mr Himiltone Mwasi, the Vichwala Primary School headteacher.

Benefits of using energy-saving stoves

"We are now using less firewood to prepare meals and this has greatly reduced the burden on the children who collect firewood, leaving them with more time to concentrate on their studies," adds Mr Mwasi. This has helped improve academic performance at the school, which has seen its mean score in the Kenya Certificate of Primary Education go up from 200 marks in 2016 to 244 marks in 2017.

Nature Kenya's Sites and Species Manager Paul Gacheru notes that the benefits of the energy-saving stoves go beyond improved grades for schools. "Taita Hills forests hold a unique range of biodiversity, including the endemic, critically threatened Taita Apalis. Reducing the dependency on these forests for firewood is a major step towards safeguarding their posterity," says Gacheru.

Going by this calculation, one school can save up to 14 hectares of forest annually!

Schools are also being encouraged to establish their own woodlots to sustain their fuelwood demands.

The setting of the sun brings the day to an end at Vishwa Primary School. Pupils stream out of their classes to head home. It has been another fruitful day, both for learning and for the conservation of adjacent forests.