Huge numbers of trees have been cut down for ϐirewood and timber in Malawi. In many places this has caused ϐlooding and soil erosion washing bridges and even entire hillsides away, and reducing farmers yields. It has also had a devastating effect on wildlife and biodiversity, particularly as many of the overseas funded tree planting projects are large monoculture plantations.

 

Co-operative Climate Action (CCA) are concentrating on ϐirst providing a sustainable source of fuel to remove the need for felling of established forests. For this purpose, we are planting a specially developed bamboo cultivar on smallholdings to provide the household, church community, smallholder co-operative, or school with all the fuel they need and, in most cases, a surplus that can be sold. Three years after planting, a third of the canes can be harvested annually without harming the plant which absorbs carbon faster than any tree. In tropical areas trees grow three times faster than in northern climates and absorb three to nine times as much carbon. Tropical species of bamboo measure an annual biomass of 47.8t/ha/pa almost twice that of even fast-growing trees like Eucalyptus. Furthermore, the plants live for 50-150 years providing a more permanent carbon sink than most fast-growing trees. Land, and labour for planting, maintenance and security are also much cheaper than in the UK so this represents unrivalled value in terms of the cost of absorbing carbon and the speed at which it can be achieved.

 

Removing the need to cut trees for ϐirewood will have a major impact on preserving and restoring biodiversity. We are partnering the Wildlife and Environmental Association of Malawi (WESM) who have 3000 wildlife clubs around the country to provide the education and support needed to ensure the plants survive for many years. This involves providing planters with information/training on planting, watering, monitoring, and harvesting. whilst also raising awareness of the richness of their local environment and how to beneϐit from protecting it.

 

WESM’s links with planters will be developed to help their communities establish bamboo-based businesses (eg ϐirewood, goat fodder, edible shoots, charcoal, carpentry) to increase their income. A selfhelp mentality will be encouraged by obtaining a small contribution from planters to the plant cost and getting repayment for the rest out of the ϐirst year’s harvest. This will also encourage planters to value the plants and thereby reduce losses. Any income from this source will be used by WESM to buy further plants to gradually achieve economic sustainability. Sadly corruption is endemic in Malawi, but establishing small community based planting groups based on co-operative values and principles greatly reduces the risk of political interference.

 

In partnership with CCA, WESM will also offer information and support to help build community resilience to the impacts of climate change. The clumping bamboos we plant can contribute being noninvasive, making excellent windbreaks, and having a much shallower root system than trees. Local subsistence farmers cannot always provide space on productive land, so we engage with communities to identify unused areas of land, such as boundaries, for planting. We will subsequently undertake natural regeneration and planting of selected mixed tree species to meet local needs. In addition to restoring natural forests, trees can be intercropped with maize, casava etc or planted in areas unsuitable for agriculture.

 

Each planting community will become a member of Co-operative Climate Action and join a WhatsApp group to give them access to advice and support. They can also use the CCA Resource Centre near Nkhotakota which will be further developed to act as a centre for piloting and sharing practical ideas for increasing the resilience of rural communities in Malawi to climate change.

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Until relatively recently, these hills around Blantyre were covered in natural forest