Although Uganda’s share of the total global GHG emissions is still insignificant, the country’s sectors emission profile is growing with Agriculture as a leading source of GHG emissions and Land Use Change and Forestry (LUCF) as the second most significant source. It is envisaged that implementation of prioritized measures in energy supply, forestry and wetlands will result into cumulative impact of approximately 22% reduction of overall national emissions in 2030. It is against this backdrop that EBAFOSA Uganda Leveraged EBA and clean energy to create climate action enterprises.

Uganda has set timeline to achieve several Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) actions sooner. Uganda seeks to mainstream climate resilience across sectors and develop early warning systems and robust monitoring systems, much earlier than originally planned. Although Uganda’s share of the total global GHG emissions is still insignificant, the country’s sectors emission profile is growing with Agriculture as a leading source of GHG emissions and Land Use Change and Forestry (LUCF) as the second most significant source. However, the country is at risk of losing all its forests if deforestation in Uganda continues at its present rate there would be no forests left in 40 years . It is envisaged that implementation of prioritized measures in energy supply, forestry and wetlands will result into cumulative impact of approximately 22% reduction of overall national emissions in 2030. It is against this backdrop that EBAFOSA Uganda Leveraged EBA and clean energy to create climate action enterprises.

This work has leveraged complementarity between EBAdriven agriculture with clean energy to unlock enterprises that scale both EBA and clean energy. In Uganda- Buganda Kingdom, cassava value chain is being enhanced by retooling urban youths and rural women skills to make quality briquettes which are dried using solar dryers, which are more efficient and effective than open sun-drying. EBAFOSA Uganda has linked cassava famers mainly women to solar drying centers, where women use the waste from cassava and other agricultural waste to make quality briquette for their home use and commercial purposes. In particular, Sub-Sahara Africa and Uganda’s energy sector is dominated by biomass, which contributes over 90% of the total expendable energy4 and herein firewood and charcoal contribute more than 85%. The main use of biomass energy is cooking and or heating either as firewood or charcoal majorly by local households. EBAFOSA is promoting briquettes use and clean cook stove in Buganda Kingdom to help develop and drastically reduce people’s dependence on firewood for cooking and provide employment to urban youth. Scaling of solar solutions and climate action enterprises is essential. This is advocated in the Uganda NDCs to ensure durability.

Uganda is at risk of losing all its forests if deforestation in Uganda continues at its present rate there would be no forests left in 40 years due to deforestation .Uganda experiences high rates of forest cover loss. Other reasons of deforestation include: poor rural electrification and costly electricity which makes 90% of Ugandans to use firewood and charcoal as the main sources of fuel to cook . Large amounts of forests are also spent as trees are cut for timber and wood because the construction industry still greatly use timber rather than steel and other substitutes Biomass is the predominant type of energy used in Uganda, accounting for 94% of the total energy consumption in the country . Charcoal is mainly used in the urban areas while firewood, agroresidues and wood wastes are widely used in the rural areas. Firewood is used mainly on threestone fires in rural households and in food preparation by commercial vendors in urban areas. Through the waste recovery to domestic energy, this work is directly implementing Uganda’s NDCs objectives. Specifically, those on reversing deforestation towards increasing forest cover to 21% and increasing cooing energy efficiency to 40% over traditional cooking.

This is being achieved through the increased investment in fuel briquettes – a key source of efficient & sustainable biomass highlighted in the NDCs. This work also enhances achievement of Uganda’s Renewable Energy policy by providing affordable, efficient domestic fuel briquettes as alternatives to charcoal and firewood use. Specifically, the policy aims to reduce consumption of both wood and charcoal as strategic to combat both indoor pollution as well as deforestation. Economically, waste recovery to briquettes not only taps into a ready market with over 80% to 90% of Uganda’s population dependent on biomass, but stands to create up to 20,000 alternative jobs and over $60 million contribution to GDP by creative viable and affordable alternatives to fossil fuels.

Motivation by UNEP-EBAFOSA to spearhead the clean energy initiative in Uganda

It is estimated that dependency on fuel wood and charcoal is on the increase in sub-Saharan Africa, with 2 – 3 times higher per-capita consumption than any other region. This dependency also fuels degradation of forest ecosystems resulting in loss of critical forest goods such as fruits, medicines etc., and services such as erosion control, water quality, etc. The cumulative effect is large scale resource depletion that threatens sustainability, with up to 50% degrading of forest ecosystems in some countries. This is part of the $68billion lost annually in Africa due to land degradation. The urgency for remedial measures through enterprises that offer alternative clean cooking options is therefore critical to preserve not only human health but also heath of ecosystems. Waste recovery to fuel briquettes offers a non-capital-intensive area, that youth can be engaged in, to co-operate around offering viable clean cooking solutions to the community. But the first step to engage these youth is retooling their skills. This means, that youth of diverse areas of training are structurally guided and inspired to systematically improve, refine and adapt their skills, regardless of area of training, and to engage in converting agro-waste to fuel briquettes and trading in these briquettes. It is against this backdrop that EBAFOSA Uganda Leveraged EBA and clean energy to create climate action enterprises.

Download the report to read more about the Uganda briquettes report.