The proposed volume attempts to understand how forms of bio-innovation might be linked to the problem of poverty and its reduction through an inquiry into a number of empirical cases of present-day bio-innovations in Asia. Conditions and circumstances in countries like Cambodia, China, India, Korea, Nepal, Philippines, and Thailand are quite different and provide a mosaic of varied experiences in bio-innovation that include shrimp farming, GMO cotton, bio gas, organic farming, and vaccines.

Offering important insights into various forms of bio-innovation efforts and their effects on poverty alleviation, this volume is divided into three major themes that organize the main sections of the book—benefits for the poor: actual, direct, and prospective benefits for the poor; absence of positive impacts and institutional constraints; pro-poor drivers and embedding in anti-poverty alleviation.

The central questions addressed here are: Ways and circumstances in which certain forms of bio-innovations affect the poor and enable poverty alleviation.; Critical factors and conditions for improving the positive impact of bio-innovations on poverty alleviation.; Poverty alleviation goals should be the point of departure in rationalizing, identifying and designing appropriate and relevant bio-innovation programs.

Biochar Stoves: An Innovation Studies Perspective

Biochar Stoves: An Innovation Studies Perspective

Biochar stoves: An innovation studies perspective
SimonShackley and SarahCarter

Introduction

This project investigated the potential for improved cook stoves (ICSs) to contribute to a sustainable strategy for poverty reduction while mitigating carbon emissions, protecting the environment, and reducing adverse health impacts. Since an important driver for our research is carbon abatement, we chose to focus upon ICS that produce ‘biochar’: these benefit carbon reduction not only through greater efficiency but also by producing a carbon-rich by-product with potential benefits as a soil amendment which can enhance certain beneficial properties of soils. Biochar is a solid, carbon rich, and highly porous residue arising from the thermal decomposition of biomass in depleted oxygen. It is a normal by-product from a gasification stove but can ...

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