PROFITS, ACCESS AND AUTHORITY ALONG GHANA’S CHARCOAL COMMODITY CHAIN
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Date
2019-06
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KNUST
Abstract
In Africa, charcoal is the main source of energy for cooking and heating in urban households.
Charcoal supply produces great wealth and engages remarkable number of people. In spite
of its economic significance, the extent to which charcoal income reduces poverty is
debatable. This study addresses the questions: (1) What profits are reaped by the different
actors in the charcoal production and trade, and what are the characteristics of actors?; (2)
By what mechanisms do actors gain, maintain and control access to benefits?; and (3) How
are institutions mediating access to opportunities, and how do that affect the legitimacy and
authority of institutions? The questions are addressed in the case of the charcoal chain
originating in the Kintampo Forest District (the main charcoal production area in Ghana)
and going to the three largest end markets in Ghana. The study employed commodity chain
analysis to quantify and explain profits, and access mapping to trace the socio-political and
economic relations in which charcoal benefits are located. The study estimates that Ghana’s
charcoal market generates US$ 66 million income annually. Yet, income distribution is
highly skewed among and within actor groups. Merchants make up only 3% of the actors in
the market, yet reap 22% of the profit. Producers and retailers, the largest groups in the
sector, generate incomes below the national minimum wage. The study illuminates how the
mechanisms used by various groups of actors to gain, maintain and control access are
dynamic in time and space. It shows how significant incomes are derived by those in control
of the market while those in control of the production process generate much lower levels
of profits. The study documents force, moral economy, social movement and innovation as
structural and relational access mechanisms that allow actors to benefit. The study further
demonstrates that chiefs, having no legal mandate in trees, are gaining overall authority in
Ghana’s charcoal production. Chiefs’ authority is drawn from long-established customs and
social structures in land/tree management, as well as validating of claims. The Ghana
Forestry Commission de facto have very limited authority over trees for charcoal production
despite their de jure mandate in this regard. The study suggests that improving equity and
wellbeing along charcoal chains requires more attention on access mechanisms operating
on charcoal markets, especially access to capital, information and buyers. The legitimacy of
institutions stems from the coercive and social ability to control access to resources and opportunities.
Description
A thesis submitted to the Department of Silviculture and Forest Management in partial
fulfilment of the requirement for the degree of DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN SILVICULTURE AND FOREST
MANAGEMENT