Biomass Burning in Lesotho

Abstract

Lesotho, one of the smallest countries in the world with an area of about 38,600 km², and wholly landlocked in South Africa, is characterized as one of the least developed countries with about 57% and 29% of households still classed as poor and ultra-poor, respectively, in 2009. Like many economies at its level, it is plagued with underdeveloped infrastructure. Owing to its rugged terrain, with about 75% classified as rural mountainous areas, it has suffered severe soil erosion leading to very deep gulleys in the lowlands making movements very challenging. Despite the Lesotho Energy Policy advocating for reduced consumption of biomass for energy, the energy sector still relies heavily on burning of biomass (about 80%) with a considerably small percentage accessing electricity albeit mostly in the urban areas (45%). Sources of biomass include firewood from wild vegetation including bushes and shrubs, animal dung and crop-waste the three of which account for almost 80% of total energy use for cooking and heating. The indiscriminate burning of grasslands by herdboys, poses a threat not only to biodiversity loss, but importantly to the main energy source biomass as the shrubs and bushes usually take longer time to grow than the grass that is often the reason for setting veld fires by the herdboys. The ever-increasing cost of electricity compounded with the low employment rate exacerbates the energy security scare. This has prompted many initiatives in exploring the other possible sources such as renewable energy, production of energy-efficient stoves, biogas generation, just to mention but a few. However, these strides are still stifled by poor to no funding and they still remain research areas than fully exploited areas for economic development. A call is made for a concerted effort to seek alternatives since not all citizens can be accessed by the grid owing to the rugged terrain of the country.