Pervasive charcoal trade getting major rethink in Haiti
MANICHE, Haiti — Pungent wood smoke wafts daily across the hinterlands of Haiti’s southern peninsula, where villagers stack smouldering wood beneath dirt mounds to make the charcoal that nearly all the urban households in the country use to cook every meal.
For decades, authorities and development workers have denounced such rural charcoal makers for stripping the nation’s forests, sending topsoil to sea and helping make Haiti the poorest country in the Americas. The stigma is so great that few openly admit their involvement.
But this view is starting to change due to a growing body of research suggesting much of the blame for Haiti’s deforestation lies elsewhere — and that a regulated use of wood-based charcoal might be able to provide livelihoods without decimating mangroves and other remaining natural forests.
“Charcoal doesn’t need to be the enemy. We know how to make it without killing the land,” said Victor Moise, leader of a rural collective in southwest Maniche, where last year’s Hurricane Matthew split mature trees like matchsticks and devastated crops while sparing young, fast-growing trees intended for charcoal.