Socioeconomic and Environmental Impacts and Contributions to Sustainability

Firewood, dung and charcoal dominate household energy consumption in many developing countries. The lack of access to modern energy services is more acute in Sub-Saharan Africa where 89 per cent of the population still relies on traditional biomass energy compared to 0.05 in North Africa and the Middle East (Gaye 2007, UNDP 2010). Modern bioenergy is often an important alternative in most rural areas in developing countries if adequate conditions (e.g. soil, water, and land availability among others) are in place, or are put in place without negative impacts. There are different feedstocks grown in Africa that could potentially be used for energy generation or alternative fuel. Sugarcane is an example of the potential for biomass modernisation on a larger scale. The sugarcane plant is one of the most promising agricultural sources of biomass energy in the world. It is a highly efficient converter of solar energy, and has the highest energy-to-volume ratio among energy crops. It is found predominantly in developing countries, due to environmental requirements that restrict its growth to tropical and sub-tropical climates. This chapter will review the main socio-economic and environmental impacts of the use of sugar cane in Africa as a bioenergy crop and the implications of these positive and/or negative impacts in terms of their contribution to sustainability. Some of the relevant work done by the CARENSA project will be summarised where appropriate