Abstract

This work studied charcoal production in Otukpo Local Government Area (LGA) to ascertain its socioeconomic and environmental impacts in Adoka communities. Villages involved in charcoal production were identified using snowball sampling techniques. A Multi-stage sampling was employed to select respondents. Personal interview with semi-structured questionnaire was employed for data collection. Five villages were purposively selected from two Council Wards in the LGA. Five (5) Charcoal producers and marketers were also purposively selected in each village for administration of questionnaire. Data collected were analyzed using one-way Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) with Duncan Multiple Range used as follow test where the is significant. Descriptive statistics such as tables and charts were used for result presentation. Results revealed that males (80%) were higher than females (10%) in charcoal production in Adoka. Youths between ages of 21 – 30 years (58%) with secondary education (58%) were foremost in the business. Prosopis africana was the most preferred tree species used for charcoal production. A number of trees (150 trees) were felled per week in Adoka-Ehaje to production charcoal while 68 trees felled were in Adoka-Icho weekly. On monthly bases, charcoal producers in Adoka-Ehaje earned N301,000 and above, while in AdokaIchoN251,000 – N 300,000 was earned monthly. In Adoka-Ehaje, 44.8% earnings from charcoal were used for feeding and clothing and 24.14 %was used for building of houses and payment of school fees respectively. While in Adoka-Icho, payment of school fees, feeding and clothing and building of houses (35%, 30% and 25%) were observed as socio-economic benefits from charcoal production. Respondents claimed that soil erosion was the highest (30.43%) impact of charcoal production in Adoka followed by climate change, loss of habitat, loss of watershed, extinction of plants and land dispute (27.77%, 26.32%, 11.11% and 10.53%), respectively. It was concluded that although charcoal production in Adoka communities of Otukpo LGA contribute positively to socio-economic livelihood of respondents, it negatively impacts the environment by means of soil erosion, loss of habitat and climate change.