Study on the benefits of Solar Ovens in the Bolivia Amazon Based on the Programme Implemented by Christian Aid and partners in Bolivia “Women With Energy” Report written by The Bolivian Climate Change Platform 2019 Translation by Emma Donlan Photo Soluciones Practicas Bolivia 1. INTRODUCTION Christian Aid together with local partners: CIPCA Beni, Soluciones Prácticas, Inti Illimani and the Bolivian Platform Against Climate Change have been working with indigenous organizations and communities located in the Bolivian Amazon to implement territorial management plans. Local economic development programs have been designed for eco-community tourism and eco- agriculture, attracting multiple stakeholders, to build the resilience of the most vulnerable communities. The Christian Aid programme in Bolivia focuses on: renewable energies, young entrepreneurs, agroforestry systems and support through incubators funds for small businesses with the objective of generating sustainable alternative development models, as opposed to the predatory agroindustry, which threatens livelihoods. In recent years, these communities in the Bolivian Amazon have suffered severe natural disasters, especially from floods, droughts and fires that have affected the livelihoods of indigenous families; and it seems that women have been the most affected. Faced with this situation, Christian Aid together with local partners have implemented different development projects, including the solar oven project which has had excellent results in terms of local ownership, use of solar energy, reduction in the use of firewood, generating more free time for 1 women and other benefits. This document presents the base line of this project, enabling us to more systematically measure the impact of the lives of women, their environment, their resilience and their livelihoods. The Baseline of the Project "Women with energy: solar ovens in the Amazon" has been jointly developed, above all with the objective of determining the current status of progress in the implementation of solar ovens and implications for relationships within families and within the communities already using the solar ovens and also looking at other families that do not yet have the solar ovens but which would only benefit from the project, to evaluate their current situation and to make comparisons in relation to the impacts generated by the project. The Baseline study has been developed with a sample of the beneficiary families living in the Municipalities of San Ignacio de Mojos, San Andres, San Javier, Baures and Rurrenabaque located in the department of Beni, and San Buenaventura and Apolo in the Department of La Paz, using survey instruments, focus groups, interviews with leaders and authorities, and interviews with technicians who are implementing the project. Subsequently, the information has been systematized and organized into the study variables: • use of the solar ovens; • use and cost of fossil fuel and firewood; • role of women; • welfare of the family; • gender roles; • and acceptance / appropriation of the solar ovens by the public 2. BACKGROUND The Amazon hosts the greatest diversity of ecosystems, species and genetic resources of the earth. Very diverse forest and aquatic ecosystems across the entire watershed, from dense forests, open forests, submerged forests, cloud forests, savannas, lakes and rivers with very different characteristics. It is estimated that the region has up to 30% of the flora and fauna species in the world. "Nearly 3,000 species of plants used for various purposes have been classified, many of them with the potential to provide medicines, pesticides, dyes, aromas, fibres, oils, wood and food, among others" (BRACK, 1995). The region is also the depository of important hydro-energetic, hydrocarbon and mineral resources. Although forests generally rest on nutrient-poor lands, therefore, they are not suitable for agricultural uses, areas with good soils where agricultural activities can be developed have been located, provided that the appropriate technologies and inputs are used (BRACK, 1995). The Bolivian Amazon covers an area of 475,278 km2, equivalent to 43.3% of the entire national surface area, involving five departments: Pando, Beni, La Paz, Cochabamba and Santa Cruz. It is constituted by a mosaic of extensive humid tropical forests, flooded savannahs, semi-humid transition forests characterized by high biodiversity found in the Chaco region to the sub-Andean forest. A total of 88 municipalities are part of the Bolivian Amazon and 15% of the Bolivian population lives in this region (RAISG: 2009) About the municipalities where the Christian Aid solar oven project is implemented, they are the most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. They are exposed to the inclemency of floods during the rainy season and to drought and forest fires the dry season. These natural disasters destroy the 2 wealth of flora and fauna of the forests. The Amazon area of Bolivia also has the largest number of Indigenous Peoples, no less than 16 indigenous peoples of the 36 groups recognized in the Political Constitution of the Plurinational State of Bolivia. Photo Christian Aid However, the Amazon has become a global concern since the 1980s, due to the accelerated deforestation caused by the colonization and regional integration programs promoted with aggressiveness by the governments from the 1980s onwards. The main component of these programs was the construction of several roads to link different communities and towns in the Amazon. Other critical elements have included the implementation of fiscal and credit incentives for agricultural production, the construction of large hydroelectric dams, mining projects, and the state supported immigration from the poorest highlands regions of the country. As a result, the region has experienced the rapid expansion of livestock activity along the roadways, which has resulted in becoming the main cause of deforestation in the region. The conservation of forests is especially important for the mitigation of climate change, since forests contain 80% of all carbon stored in terrestrial vegetation. In turn, tropical forests contain about 25% of the carbon in the Earth's biosphere. Additionally, Amazonian forests have a high capacity to capture carbon (or in more simplistic terms: produce oxygen). In recent decades, Amazonian forests have helped to slow down the pace of climate change thanks to their ability to produce oxygen or capture carbon. In normal years Amazonian forests capture and store 18,000 million tons of carbon, twice as much carbon as the combined emissions of all fossil fuels burned in the world (BRIENEN et al., 2011). Between the end of 2013 and the first half of 2014, a large part of the Bolivian Amazon (Beni, North of La Paz and areas of Pando, Santa Cruz and Cochabamba) suffered severe flooding. The constant 3 rains during that period caused the extensive Amazonian rivers to overflow and destroy the assets of many people. The water rose at unprecedented levels affecting urban, peri-urban and indigenous and peasant communities (their productive and economic systems, and their livelihoods, as well as other sectors). The aftermath of the phenomenon lasted throughout 2014 and the subsequent years. Faced with this situation, Christian Aids’ partners that form part of the consortium that is currently implementing the "Solar Ovens" project, identified that one of the main problems during and after the floods was the difficulty to prepare food, given the fact that the no dry fuel was available and everywhere was covered in mud. Faced with this situation together with the communities the partners proposed to implement a pilot project using solar ovens, to respond to the need to provide a mechanism for preparing food for the most vulnerable forest families during floods. The project generated great interest among families beyond the reach of the initial pilot, leading to its extension and scale up from 2016 to 2019, because, as this document presents, the solar ovens are now being used in multiple ways and have generated new leaderships, especially among the women who are using them, with greater participation in local and municipal decision-making processes. 3. JUSTIFICATION Photo Christian Aid The communities with which Christian Aid and partners have been working are extremely vulnerable to the exacerbated effects of climate change, such as floods and forest fires, due to prolonged and intense rainy and dry seasons in recent decades. The impacts of these phenomena affect women more, as they are often the only ones left to manage family resources when their partners migrate for paid work, and women have less alternative livelihoods when crops are lost. 4 In the last three years Christian Aid and local partners have been implementing pilot projects on innovative solar technology in communities that have experienced extreme floods and forest fires. The use of Solar technology is not common in the Amazon, and there are few or any records of similar projects that have been implemented in the past. Despite the initial concerns about weather conditions and the challenges of adapting traditional ways of cooking (with fossil fuels) and firewood, families who have adopted the solar ovens testify that the project has had excellent results to date in terms of appropriation, female empowerment and leadership, and reduction in the use of fossil fuels. However, this is not supported by a study or formal diagnosis carried out in a more organized