The Virunga Environmental Program by WWF has implemented an Improved Stoves project to reduce threats to Virunga National Park by lowering charcoal consumption in Goma. The project works with associations to widely produce and distribute an efficient stove model. A study found stove usage increased from 10% of households in 2008 to 60% in 2011. This program is estimated to have reduced Goma's annual charcoal consumption by over 20%, saving over 10,000 tons of charcoal typically sourced from Virunga Park and over $6 million in fuel costs for Goma residents.

1. Virunga Environmental Program
Energy Saving Department
Above : Production units in Goma
Under : Quality control - Outlet
September 2012
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2. Summary
The Improved Stoves project contributes to the overall objective of the World Wide Fund
for Nature’s ‘Environmental Programme around Virunga’ (WWF/PEVi) to fight poverty
and support local development in order to reduce threats to the Virunga National Park. The
project also works in conjunction with our EcoMakala project, which aims at encouraging
small farmers to establish tree plantations for charcoal production to supply the market in
the Goma urban zone. In addition, by addressing the energy crisis in urban areas
surrounding the Park, WWF addresses one of the major concerns of our main partner,
ICCN, who is responsible for managing the Virunga National Park.
The Improved Stoves project was started in May 2008 and since then it has been through a
number of phases to overcome the barriers to production and widespread usage of
improved stoves in the city of Goma.
To quickly produce sustainable results, the project adopted a strategy of relying on
previous experiences in the field of energy saving, collaborating with small structures
already in place, promoting quality production, minimizing subsidies as much as possible
to follow the best market forces, and finally, using several modern marketing strategies in
rder to quickly publicize new products on the market in the city.o
2009 was mainly a year of development. It was only in 2010 and 2011 that the project was
actually able to widely produce and spread the use of improved stoves.
This acceleration of production and sales was driven by several initiatives at the program
level:
‐ A market study: “What do people want?” which brought us to decide to concentrate
on one model of improved stove, the Jiko Nguvu Nyeusi,.
‐ A large rotating capital fund was made available to associations so that they could
acquire quality raw materials in sufficient quantity to meet demand.
‐ An intensive information campaign conducted on the radio for several months
succeeded in informing a broad segment of the population of the city about the
efficiency of the stoves and the existence of outlets, spread throughout the city.
‐ Redeployment of outlets of improved stoves to strategic locations in the city which
boosted sales to customers who previously did not know where to obtain them.
It is important to note that since 2009, more and more manufacturers in the city of Goma
have abandoned the production of the traditional stove in favor of the improved Jiko
Nguvu Nyeusi. Moreover, it is in this context that the program has also provided training
to improve the quality of their production.
Three years after launching the program, a study of the use of improved stoves in Goma
allowed us to draw initial conclusions.
Approximately six out of ten households in Goma were using an improved stove in 2011.
In 2008, the proportion was one out of ten. Three quarters of households using an
improved stove, use the Jiko Nguvu Nyeusi model. This model uses half as much charcoal
as the model that was most prevalent in Goma in 2008.
WWF PEVi – IMPROVED STOVES – September 2012 2/8

3. A cautious estimate indicates that this model of improved stove on its own has reduced the
city of Goma’s consumption of charcoal by over 20%.
A reduction of 20 % in consumption by a city like Goma corresponds to a minimum
reduction of 13,255 tons of charcoal a year. If 80% of the charcoal comes from Virunga
National Park, we can conclude that 10,604 tons of charcoal from the park are saved by the
use of this improved stove. Converted into hectares, it can be estimated that nearly 3,181
ha of natural forests have been saved in 2012 by the fact that almost half the population of
Goma uses the Jiko Nguvu Nyeusi stove.
Converted into economic terms, this same saving of charcoal has enabled half of the
population of the city to halve its fuel expenses, which corresponds to over 6,612,500 USD
for the whole city of Goma for year 2012.
Authors:
‐ Thierry BODSON (WWF PEVi – Program Manager)
tbodson@wwfcarpo.org
‐ Consolée KAVIRA (WWF PEVi – Responsible in charge of the energy saving
program)
ckavira@wwfcarpo.org
For more information about the ‘Improved Stoves’ project, please contact the authors.
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4. 1. Lessons Learned and Future Prospects of the Improved
Stoves Program.
Lessons learned:
At the production level:
- The importance of establishing high quality standards especially when beginning work
with informal associations.
- The importance of continued training. One or two trainings are not sufficient; the
introduction of weekly quality control visits played an important role in strengthening the
quality of work among the associations. The use of the best craftsmen to control
production quality was also a wise choice.
- The importance of creating synergies between associations, e.g., pooling of working
capital for the purchase of raw material (clay and BG28 metal sheets).
- The study on the use of the improved stoves in Goma shows that the stoves produced by
the associations supported by WWF have covered a part of the demand for improved
stoves. However, it is reasonable to consider that WWF has literally created a ripple effect
that has motivated several producers of stoves to convert to the production of the Jiko
Nguvu Nyeusi stove.
At the commercialization level:
- The importance of controlling the price in the beginning so that it is both sufficiently
profitable to producers and sellers, while being attractive enough for buyers.
- Reduce subsidies to a minimum and instead invest in good marketing.
- Communicate, in a balanced way, to a wide public through radio messages using popular
hosts, as well as locally through public demonstrations and visits to homes. Advertising by
word of mouth is very effective but can only function after a significant percentage of
households already have an improved stove at home.
Future prospects:
At the production level:
- Improve the performances of the Jiko Nguvu Nyeusi following the advice from technical
specialists.
- Diversification of model types (different sizes) in order to better respond to the needs of
the clients.
- Create a network of producers of improved stoves.
- All of the associations we are supervising have taken the initiative to establish a network.
This organization is now recognized by various government services and has recently
opened a bank account to receive and manage rotating capital.
- Develop our activities in rural areas (Mwenda, Mikeno, ...) in order to also respond to
their need of conserving wood.
At the commercialization level:
- Cease the subsidy and liberate pricing to encourage market forces as the efficiency of the
stoves has been established, and as the stoves are now an economic interest to the people
of the city of Goma.
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5. - Associations which produce stoves want to sell them too in order to increase their
benefit. (vertical integration)
2. Impact of the Improved Stoves program
2.1. Environnemental
In late 2008, a study conducted in Goma established that only 7% of the population used
improved stoves. At the end of 2011, a new study in Goma reported that this had increased
to 59%. Moreover, most of these users had acquired an improved stove during the year and
75.6% of them used the Jiko Nguvu Nyeusi stove which is the one the WWF supervised
associations produce in large quantities. This stove has repeatedly shown to reduce the
consumption of charcoal by 50% compared to traditional stoves. Moreover and according
to the results of the study, this type was used by 44.6% of households in the city of Goma.
In other words, this type of improved stove must have reduced charcoal consumption of
the city of Goma by over 22.3%.
The latest estimate of the consumption of charcoal in Goma was determined in 2008 by the
NGO ACF (Africa Conservation Fund). It estimated that 59,435 tons of charcoal were
consumed per year by households in Goma and a priori 80% of the charcoal came from
Virunga National Park. In 2011, the consumption level of the city had certainly increased
with population growth. We can then estimate the order of magnitude improved stoves are
likely to reduce the needs of the households of the city in 2012 and ultimately logging in
Virunga National Park.
Thus, 22.3% of 59,435 tons equals 13,255 tons of charcoal that is saved in one year. If
80% of the charcoal comes from Virunga National Park, 10,604 tons of charcoal from the
park will be saved. To convert tons of charcoal to cubic meters of wood, it is important to
know the carbonization yield (i.e. number of kilos of wood necessary to carbonize in order
to produce a kilo of coal). In addition, the weight of wood depends on its nature and its
moisture content, which also depends on drying time. For timber felled in the park, it is
reasonable to assume that one m3
of wood weighs 800 kg. In the case of illegally produced
charcoal in the park, one can assume that it is not properly dried and that the charcoal kilns
were built in haste, therefore to produce one ton of charcoal requires at least 12 tons of
humid wood, or in this case 15 m3
of wood per ton of coal.
FAO data indicate that the volume of timber per hectare in open forest in the DRC is
estimated at 50 m3
/ha. This same source tells us that the volume of timber of a mountain
forest in Rwanda is estimated at 130 m3
/ha. Known areas of logging in the park are
predominantly on the southwest flank of the volcano Nyiragongo. (See satellite photo
below).
WWF PEVi – IMPROVED STOVES – September 2012 5/8

6. This area actually consists of
partly cleared forest and partly
dense forest and realistically a
more accurate volume of
timber is a median value of 90
m3
/ha. Therefore, because
illegal charcoal makers do not
clear-cut but perform selective
logging, the most accurate
estimate of wood extracted per
hectare is probably 50 m3
.
Based on these considerations,
we believe that approximately
3,181 ha of natural forest may
be saved in 2012 thanks to the
fact that already 44.6% of
households in Goma use the
Jiko Nguvu Nyeusi stove.
2.2. From a socio-economic point of view
One of the most important socio-economic impacts of our program is the reduction of
expenses on charcoal. This saving of around 50% is not negligible since one third of the
households spend more than 10% of their monthly budget on charcoal. If we estimate
money saved in 2012 for all households in Goma who have a Jiko Nguvu Nyeusi
improved stove, we are approaching a considerable sum of 6,612,500 USD (13,225,000 kg
x 0.5 USD / kg of charcoal).
Another important impact of the program was the creation of jobs that have primarily
promoted women's employment. We have supported and trained 63 associations to
develop their business in the field of production or sale of improved stoves. Together they
provide employment to more than 820 people (618 women and 202 men).
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7. 3. Global balance of the energy program
3.1. Improving the value chain of the wood fuel
If during the past 4 years the improved stove program has helped to improve the use of
wood as an energy source in households, the EcoMakala program contributed on its side to
create an alternative to illegal logging and non-sustainable timber in the Virunga National
Park through the installation of 3,900 ha (until October 2012) of private plantations. The
first plantings began to be harvested in early 2012. Simultaneously, support was given to
the ICCN to strengthen the fight against illegal logging in the park and to avoid the
unequal competition of all timber exported from the park.
In addition to improving the value chain, the process of wood carbonization was also
improved by strengthening the technical capacity of charcoal makers.
3.2. Energy supply in the long run.
Despite advances in the field of wood supply and energy conversion, these advances will
not meet long-term energy needs of the North Kivu province, due to population growth
and limited space to install plantations. New energy sources, other than wood, will have to
be further developed to complement wood energy (domestic/cooking gas mainly).
Evolution of energy need in the city of Goma from 2005 to 2015
0
10000
20000
30000
40000
50000
60000
70000
80000
90000
100000
2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015
Year
Charcoalconsumption(Tons)
Charcoal consumption
(Tons/year) Trend - business
as usual
Impact of improved stoves
program on consumption
(Tons/year)
EcoMakala Production
(Tons/year)
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8. The graphic above intends to show how we expect to respond to the energy need of the
population in Goma till the end of 2015 if at the same time ICCN manages to reduce
access to wood inside the park.
-The blue line indicates a scenario “business as usual “
- The pink line indicates how the improved stoves program has already influenced and
might influence in the next three years the consumption of charcoal in Goma.
- The yellow line indicates the charcoal that will be produced at the level of EcoMakala for
the next three years as an alternative to the charcoal produced inside the park.
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