With bamboo being projected as one of the best resources for carbon sequestration, other than tree forests and mangroves, this woody grass is taking centre-stage on the global concerns on climate emergencies, including global temperature rise leading to global warming and subsequently the occurrence of unprecedented climate-related disasters.
By Salam Rajesh
The value chain management and sustainable development in the bamboo sector is today a challenging task that requires analysis, dissection and re-emphasis to modernize the traditional uses of bamboo, according to Kamesh Salam, the former president of the World Bamboo Organization and the founding executive director of South Asia Bamboo Foundation (SABF).
SABF has developed a mobile apps Bamtech for the first time in the world which will enable bamboo workers, manufacturers and planters to understand and engage in networking on the modern day applicability of bamboo in different work sectors, whether these be crafts, furniture, construction, architectural designs and utility items, Kamesh elaborated while stressing that bamboo is no longer the ‘poor men’s timber’ but is very much the ‘Green Gold’ due to its multi-utility functions.
Speaking at the launch of his illustrative book “Green Gold” at the Crafts Complex located at Patsoi in Imphal West District of Manipur on Sunday (28 November), Kamesh urged upon the Vice-Chancellor of Manipur Technical University, Dr Bhabeswar Tongbram to provide a platform which can fill in the gap amongst bamboo practitioners and the technological knowledge providers in achieving new outlook and perspective in value added bamboo related productions.
The publication featured the value chain of few important bamboo products, namely, bamboo-based handicraft, bamboo shoots, bamboo furniture, bamboo charcoal, and bamboo panel boards, with re-emphasis on the potential of bamboo to tap this resource economically, enabling it to become ‘Green Gold’ for bamboo practitioners.
Bamboo, the fast-growing grass plant can be found in Africa, the Asia-Pacific and the Americas. The Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)’s Global Forest Resources Assessment 2020 (FRA 2020), provide the basic information that currently bamboo covers about 35 million hectares of land across Africa, Asia, and the Americas. The FRA 2020 reports a 50 percent increase in bamboo area between 1990 and 2020, largely because of new expansion in China and India.
The FRA 2020 assessment reports that there are over 1600 known species, with thousands of uses, across these three continents. The report says that during 2019, USD 3.054 billion worth of bamboo products was exported, but while bamboo can be an important part of sustainable development in the Global South, particularly as a tool for poverty alleviation and climate change mitigation, its total spread remains elusive.
During 2021, the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and the International Bamboo and Rattan Organization (INBAR) started work on improving the global reporting on bamboo with the objective on developing ‘a set of internationally recognized methodologies and technical tools to support bamboo cover, stock and carbon storage assessments’.
One of the broad objectives was to provide training to facilitate capacity building and technical knowledge in bamboo-rich countries, and to ensure that the assessment of bamboo resources becomes a continued and sustained part of an integrated forest monitoring system. The focus would be on how to conduct bamboo resource assessments, and to monitor and assess bamboo’s carbon storage potential, and how to integrate bamboo into REDD+ projects, livelihood development programs and carbon offsetting initiatives.
Research by INBAR indicates that the ‘combination of rapid growth and continuous annual recurrence of shoots and bamboo stems (culms) means that over time bamboo groves can sequester more carbon than tree forests’. The study reflects that where traditional wood requires 20 to 50 years to reach its full height, new bamboo stems often only need one year to grow to full height. Once the plantation reaches maturity it creates 15 times more wood per hectare than tree forests.
The suggested reference is to the faster adaptability of bamboo compared to plantation of timber trees and can be harvested within a time span of three to four years in comparison to waiting for decades to harvest the timber. This gives an edge to bamboo planters and bamboo-based manufacturers over the wood-based industry.
World’s leading bamboo expert, Dr Hans Friederich referring to bamboo’s potentiality says that, “Bamboo could be a sustainable alternative for wood charcoal, especially in Africa and Asia, and lucrative African bamboo charcoal enterprises for household fuel already exist in Ethiopia, Ghana, Uganda and Zambia”.
The United Nations Forum on Forests estimates that more than 2 billion people still rely on wood fuel to meet their primary energy needs, such as cooking and heating, and much of this is charcoal. Most of the wood is generally harvested unsustainably, often illegally, and this is a principal driver of deforestation in some countries.
Deforestation in large scale is related to extensive greenhouse gas emissions and this is the major concern with climate urgency. Bamboo forests as carbon sinks is an answer to this issue while the regeneration of bamboo forests can meet the resource demand of local people for their domestic needs and in finding means for economic sustainability through bamboo-based farming, manufacturing and the marketing of value added bamboo products.
With bamboo being projected as one of the best resources for carbon sequestration, other than tree forests and mangroves, this woody grass is taking centre-stage on the global concerns on climate emergencies, including global temperature rise leading to global warming and subsequently the occurrence of unprecedented climate-related disasters.
The South Asia Bamboo Foundation’s target is in realizing the market potentiality of the woody grass to tap its resources for the benefit of hundreds of bamboo workers and manufacturers in North East India particularly to enhance their livelihoods and make the bamboo-based market viable, SABF executive director Kamesh Salam says.
With this objective in sight, SABF is collaborating with Taiwan’s National Chung Cheng University to develop the capability of bamboo farmers and manufacturers in the North East to produce world class bamboo products, Kamesh further elaborated while announcing that technicians from the University would soon be providing trainings in bamboo technology to farmers here.
(The writer is a media professional working on environmental issues. He can be contacted at [email protected])