Biomass, energy and economic and natural resource differentiation in rural Southern India

Abstract

The rural economy in India is as yet only partially monetized and continues to retain its semi-subsistence character, while at the same time undergoing the process of becoming more monetized and market-orientated. In such an economy, the proportion of traditional and modern fuels in the ‘energy basket’ of rural households depends as much on non-cash factors as on cash income, which vary considerably among the rural socioeconomic strata. A large field study was conducted in rural Karnataka, a state in southern India, which uncovers the relations between the energy situations of the rural social classes and their access to labour, land, cash and physical assets. Of equal significance are regional variations in ecology, rainfall and irrigation. The study's principal focus is the rural household, but it also includes some analysis of the energy dimensions in agricultural activities and small-scale rural services. Eight villages were covered by the survey, one in each district, carefully selected to reflect the geographic, climatic, biomass-resource and socio-economic features of Karnataka. In each village an average of 55 households were studied in depth, making up a total of 450 households. Clear and marked differentiations are uncovered between the rural social classes in various aspects of energy production, purchase, sale and consumption, as well as in labour and cash inputs into the energy flows. To cite but two major examples here: the top strata's access to traditional biomass fuels is about a third more than the bottom strata's (on average 630 as compared with 500 kg per capita per annum); in modern fuels, taking electricity as one of the main types, the skewing is very pronounced, with the top being able to afford 12 times more than the bottom (on average 60 as compared with 5 kW h per capita per annum). It is found that traditional forms of biomass are still the dominant type of energy for all rural strata, and that only the rural middle class can be said to have begun the transition towards modern fuels, although its consumption of modern fuels is still negligibly small in absolute terms. The study reveals that the rural middle class faces no energy crisis, while the ‘intermediate’ class of the small peasantry is just about managing to make ends meet in energy terms. In contrast to this, the rural wage labour class continues to remain in a state of energy crisis.