Género, leña y sostenibilidad: el caso de una comunidad de los Altos de Chiapas

Abstract

In this paper we analyse the strategies of use and management of firewood by the families in Pozuelos, a community of the municipality of Chamula, located in the Altos de Chiapas. We also explain the factors that promote or hinder the acceptance of alternative technologies that aim to reduce the consumption of firewood among rural families and thus decrease the female workload and increase the conservation of the woods. The analysis is focussed on the times and workloads of bio-fuel supply as well as on the complementarity of functions in the domestic nucleus for the collection of the resource and on the factors that interfere with technology appropriation, in this case wood-saving stoves. This work identifies the role of the women as administrators of the forestal resources for energy purposes and points out the factors that restrict the acceptance of technological changes as sociocultural, economical, climatic and technical.

Keywords

• gender
• sustainability
• firewood
• technological transfer