rural – Season Images

One day in Zimbabwe

Getting out and about

I have just spent a week in Harare – the capitol of Zimbabwe. I spent the whole week in meetings but had one day when I could take out my camera on a field trip outside the city. (One of the meetings was on the 16th floor of a building – with no working elevators! A day after I had made the climb the newspaper carried a story of a woman who had had a miscarriage climbing the stairs in the same building – a heavy price to pay.)

Climbing out of the pit

I was in Zimbabwe as a consultant to support the drafting of a new national water policy. In about 2008 the country hit the bottom. Following the economic collapse with hyper-inflation, everything ground to a halt. Wide spread unemployment meant that people could not pay their bills, local authorities had no revenue to provide basic services, infrastructure collapsed… Without electricity water and sewage pumps don’t work, raw sewage is routed directly into rivers and dams from which drinking water is drawn, massive cholera and typhoid epidemics result… And yet somehow the people continue, they have no other option. Today, although the situation has not changed much, there is hope and a sense that the corner has been turned. The resilience and energy of ordinary people on the streets and in the markets is inspiring.

Some images – Life goes on

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Images of Charcoal Impacts in Africa

[Note: A selection of charcoal images is now available for purchase and download from the Image Market – HERE.]

Uganda and Ethiopia

Charcoal market in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

I have added to my collection of images showing the impacts of the wide spread practice of charcoal making on the environment in Africa, which results in vast areas of deforestation. (See the images in the Season Images Gallery.) The use of charcoal as a cheap household energy source is just about the only option open to the ever increasing urban fringe populations where firewood has long since gone and other options such as LPG or electricity are either not available or are too expensive. For a more detailed comment on charcoaling, go to my blog entitled “Charcoal and deforestation“. On travels in Africa at the end of 2010, I captured images in Uganda and Ethiopia of urban charcoal markets – a key element in the supply chain.

Kigali – the cleanest city in Africa?

I also visited Kigali in Rwanda where there is a surprising initiative underway which has resulted in the cleanest African city I have ever seen – not a spot of garbage anywhere. A cooperative called Association for the Conservation of the Environment (ACEN) which makes briquettes from garbage as an alternative to charcoal. Garbage is brought in to several centers throughout the city and paid for – providing a marginal income for some of the poorest and resulting in the cleanest African city I have ever seen! The garbage is separated before the organics are shredded, dried and molded into briquettes – the inorganics are recycled. This results in less demand for charcoal and less pressure on rural environments, which, together with a cleaner city is a win – win for everyone.

Dealing with demons – Part 1: Development work – the realities of the long haul.

Rural development in sub-Saharan Africa is a vast area of activity embracing one of the most intractable problems of the 20th – 21st centuries. Much has been done since the end of the colonial era in the 1960s and a great deal has been achieved and yet the problems remain endemic and a real blight on the progress of human achievement. In almost all countries there remains enormous challenges in all sectors – health, education, agriculture, housing, financial systems, human rights, and basic services such as energy, water supply, transport and communications. The great irony is that today – March 30, 2010 – whilst millions of people carried dirty water to impoverished homes all over Africa, scientists celebrated the first successful particle collision in the Large Hadron Collider in Cern, Switzerland in the biggest machine ever built costing untold billions of dollars. Continue reading “Dealing with demons – Part 1: Development work – the realities of the long haul.”

Charcoal and deforestation

[Note: A selection of charcoal images is now available for purchase and download from the Image Market – HERE.]

If you travel virtually anywhere in rural Africa you cannot fail to notice a growing environmental crisis – deforestation caused by charcoaling. All households have basic energy needs which have to be met in the preparation of food, heating, boiling of water and other requirements. Traditionally these needs have been met with the use of fuelwood. With ever growing urbanization throughout Africa, fuelwood is not an option – the vegetation is just not available in urban fringe areas. Other options of electricity, kerosine and LPG gas are beyond the affordability of the vast majority of the poverty stricken urban fringe populations across the continent and so charcoal has become the only possible choice. Continue reading “Charcoal and deforestation”