SEWomen

In the mangroves areas of Ramsar site 1017 in Benin, women activities (salt production, fish smoking and household food cooking) are the most important that consume firewood (Adanguidi et al., 2020)[1]. Women without adequate support mainly develop these activities. They have to find time to collect or buy the wood and stay near the fire for its control. Moreover, important smokes are generated with the firewood that cause eyes diseases for the women in addition to air pollution. On average 8.21 m3 of firewood and 23.19 kg of charcoal were consumed per capita in 2018 in the mangroves areas in Benin (Adanguidi et al., 2020). Annual firewood and charcoal needs were 12.83 m3 and 36.25 kg per capita, respectively. For salt production and fish smoking, the annual need for firewood was 18m3 per woman. A gap of around 36% remains to be filled to meet wood energy needs in the mangroves areas in Benin. The wood needs would be 18.86 hm3 for firewood and 53,271.49 tons for charcoal in 2027 in the mangroves areas (Adanguidi et al., 2020). Sustainable strategies including solar energy should therefore be defined to meet these energy needs and save mangrove ecosystems as well as women time allocation for wood collection and exposition to heat and smoke.

The Laboratory of Applied Ecology (LEA) is conducting a research development project on Solar Energy and biotechnologies for Women business in mangroves areas of Ramsar site 1017 in 10 villages in Benin (SEWomen) financially supported by International Development Center (IDRC). However, more than 50 villages in the Ramsar site 1017 were concerned with the salt production and fish smoking activities of women. 

The solar cooker saves women time and resources for firewood collection and fire maintenance. Many diseases come from the smoke from burning firewood. These diseases will be significantly reduced with the use of solar cooker, so women will also save money for medicine. More than 720 tons of salt and 15 tons of smoked fish are produce yearly in mangroves areas with increasing demand due to the growing population. Moreover, the salt and the fish are exported in the neighbor countries that increase its demand.

We established big solar cooker (1.75m×1.75m×0.8m) with four fuel holders for salt production taking into account the traditional model of cooker used in the area. The cooker consists of pot holder, fuel holder, air supply tube, fan, lamp, photovoltaic panel and battery. The operation is based on the principle of fire maintenance by sending constant combustion air forced convection. This keeps the cooking temperature constant and thus reduces the ordinary cooking time with the same fuel. It takes 2 min to boil 5L of water. The cooker uses biochar and waste from processing of palm nuts, which costs less, than charcoal and firewood. This solar cooker is tested in 10 villages in the district of Ouidah with the project SEWomen (IDRC grant N° 109625-001). The cooker has a potential to save 3 working hours per women per day, 128300m3 of firewood per year (based on average household consumption of 12.83 m3 per year), reduce the negative impact from smoke on women health and restore the mangrove ecosystems.

Women without adequate support produce individually salt in mangrove areas using firewood. The target group is 100 women groups of 10 women per group (totaling 1000 households) for the service on salt production based on solar cooker technology. With this solar cooker, women do not need to make individual fire to produce salt but will only use this service with consent of payment. The cooker has a potential to save 3 working hours per women per day, 128300m3 of firewood per year (based on average household consumption of 12.83 m3 per year), reduce the negative impact from smoke on women health and restore the mangrove ecosystems.

The team consists of four partners (two research institutions, one small and medium-sized enterprise (SME) and one Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO)) that are leading in their respective fields, all with experience in carrying out applied research, and with complementary expertise in disciplines pertinent to the solution developed. In past transdisciplinary projects, the partners have demonstrated their ability to successfully co-develop research results with a variety of non-academic stakeholder groups, which translated directly into locally-adapted solutions. The two research institution (Laboratory of Applied Ecology of Faculty of Agronomic Sciences at University of Abomey-Calavi and School of Tropical Forestry of national University of Agriculture) bring together scientists experienced in the fields of forest management and conservation, forest ecology, behavioural sciences, communication science, consumer studies, economics, information technology, rural development and rural sociology who work in close collaboration with stakeholders on various levels. The SME (Foyer Sans Souci Company) has 8 years of experience in production of solar cooker while the NGO (CLIMA-NGO) is engaged in sustainable management of forest resources and supporting local population livelihood improvement since 10 years. The team adopts a paradigm for making use of the local stakeholders’ knowledge by involving them through a multi-actor platform continuously and repeatedly in the research process, including the co-definition of research priorities, co-diagnosis of existing approaches, co-development of locally suitable practice, co-implementation of solutions, co-monitoring their performance and co-communicating (disseminating) findings and results to relevant target groups.

The solar cooker established is at pilot stage and we need financial and technical support to establish the business model. The product is accepted in the 10 pilots’ villages without any cultural barriers. We plan to use this cooker for service where women do not need to make individual fire for salt production. Thus, more research is need on the business model than can sustain the use of the solar cooker. The cooker is mainly produced with iron that will be oxidized due the activity (salt production). Thus sustainable alternative material (e.g clay) can help to improve the quality of the cooker. Other barrier is the limited resources of the local population to buy the cooker. Thus, setting up a loan at the level of local financial institutions to allow the population to buy the cooker and pay with reduced interest rates can contribute to solve this issues. In addition, we would like to suggest a policy that will support the use of the solar cooker in the mangrove areas in order to support the conservation of the mangrove ecosystems

The solar cooker established is based on the traditional model of stove used in the study area that can support the maximum of basin (four basins) for salt production. This helps the adoption of the solar cooker by the population in all the study areas. In addition to that, the solar cooker will be used for service and women do not need to make individual fire for salt production but will use this service with consent of payment. This will save time for women to do additional income generating activities (e.g. paraecologist for tourism in mangrove) while reducing their footprint on greenhouse gas emission. Moreover women will save money used for firewood and also limit their contact with the fire that has severe impact on their health. 

The impact goal for the next year is to establish the business model of the solar cooker. For the next five years, we aim to upscale the solar cooker in all the region of mangroves ecosystems in Benin and raise awareness of policymaker at local and national level to support the upscaling of the solar cooker with policies. We will achieve the goals through communication and dissemination of the results obtained during the pilot tests in the 10 villages considered for the project SEWomen. We also plan to apply for additional funding that can support the feasibility of the upscaling of the solution in the mangrove areas. 

The solar cooker will reduce poverty in the mangrove areas by improving the salt production activity of women. Women will use the time save for individual salt production to do additional income generating activities that will improve their livelihood. The reduction of the women contact with fire and the reduction of the long distance for firewood collection will provide good health and wellbeing for their livelihood. The solar cooker uses affordable and clean energy that will reduce the footprint of women business activities on greenhouse gas emission. Decent work and economic growth will be developed for women including paraecologist for sustainable valorization of mangrove ecosystems in tourism. The solar cooker is produced by local company (Foyer Sans Souci) that will create new jobs and improve industry, innovation and infrastructure. Since the solution support women economic growth, this will reduce the inequalities in gender balance. The solution will sustain the cities and communities with good environment and improve the ecosystems services. The communities will have responsible consumption and production of mangroves ecosystems that will contribute to mitigate the impact of climate change. The good conservation of mangrove ecosystems will improve the life below mangrove water providing fish and other sea food like oysters and shrimps, and indirectly, providing spawning grounds for fish, buffer against flooding and avoided eutrophication by carbon sequestration.

We are testing the solar cooker in 10 villages with the support of International Development Research Centre (IDRC grant N° 109625-001). As the solar cooker is co-design with the local population, it is accepted and adopted in the 10 villages. Thus, we can assume that it will be upscale in all the region of mangroves ecosystems in Benin. We are conducting research activities that already provide evidence that the solar cooker reduce the wood energy consumption, the contact with the fire and times spent for wood collection and salt production. This will provide good health and wellbeing for the livelihood of population and particularly the women. Moreover, it will save time for women to do additional income generating activities to overcome poverty. We plan to train the women as paraecologist for the valorization of mangrove ecosystems for tourism. This is among the decent work that will contribute to women economic growth. The solar cooker uses biochar and waste from the processing of palm nuts, which costs less, than charcoal and firewood. The use of waste from palm nuts is a good opportunity for women processing palm nuts to increase their income. These energies are affordable and clean that will reduce the footprint of women involved in salt production activities on greenhouse gas emission. The solar cooker is produced by local company (Foyer Sans Souci) that will create new jobs and improve industry, innovation and infrastructure. Since the solution support women economic growth, this will reduce the inequalities in gender balance. With this solar cooker, wood energy demand will be significantly reduce that will contribute to mangrove and others forests conservation and thus sustain the cities and communities with good environment and improve the ecosystems services. The communities will have responsible consumption and production of mangroves ecosystems that will contribute to mitigate the impact of climate change. The good conservation of mangrove ecosystems will improve the life below mangrove water providing fish and other sea food like oysters and shrimps, and indirectly, providing spawning grounds for fish, buffer against flooding and avoided eutrophication by carbon sequestration.

We established big solar cooker (1.75m×1.75m×0.8m) with four fuel holders for salt production taking into account the traditional model of cooker used in the area. The cooker consists of pot holder, fuel holder, air supply tube, fan, lamp, photovoltaic panel and battery. The operation is based on the principle of fire maintenance by sending constant combustion air forced convection. This keeps the cooking temperature constant and thus reduces the ordinary cooking time with the same fuel. It takes 2 min to boil 5L of water. The cooker uses biochar and waste from processing of palm nuts, which costs less, than charcoal and firewood. This solar cooker is tested in 10 villages in the district of Ouidah with the project SEWomen (IDRC grant N° 109625-001). The cooker has a potential to save 3 working hours per women per day, 128300m3 of firewood per year (based on average household consumption of 12.83 m3 per year), reduce the negative impact from smoke on women health and restore the mangrove ecosystems. This solar cooker is transferred to innovative applications for the women and they do not need to make individual fire to produce salt but only use this service with consent of payment. The originality in this innovation is that it is built on the traditional system of salt production for easy adoption and also proposes a service for salt production that was never used before.