Ecofugees

Eating is such a basic necessity that it involves almost all species.
Yet, cooking is a major contributor to loss of biodiversity and warming,
particularly when charcoal, made of wood from trees, is used to power
the cooking-stoves. This current state of affair is the main cause of
deforestation that endangers the lives of many inhabitants on planet
earth. Our solution to this social problem is to bring to the cookware market an eco-friendly cooking stove, which is powered with re-used vegetable oil, to enable households, and restaurants, including food trucks, to cook on a daily basis a variety of foods that retain their local flavor, cultural taste, and healthiness. Our solution aims to improve quality of life of 2 millions Haitians living and residing in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, who are threatened by erosion, the leading cause of flooding, loss of soil, habitat, farmland, species, and famine.

The stoves used by most Haitians, particularly the working-poor, are inefficient and of poor quality. These stoves are usually made of scrap metal and have holes and open spaces that allow more air to dissipate than needed. These inefficient cooking stoves release so much heat from charcoal, that to properly cook food, Haitians may have to refill or waste extra charcoal at the end of the cooking process. This waste translates to more trees needing to be cut down for wood to produce charcoal. In Haiti, residential and commercial interests use both firewood and charcoal to heat, cook, boil water, and otherwise provide for themselves. Obtaining this wood to make charcoal can be done from clearing areas for agricultural purposes or from general gathering endeavors. Both methods take their toll on the land in the form of soil erosion, soil nutrient depletion, and loss of species (Haiti: Erosion and Deforestation Aidan McIntyre Dr. Foran ENVS 190 5/15/2019). Now deforestation and erosion are major problems among vulnerable populations in Haiti. The loss of soil and habitat, particularly farm land, threatens the lives of millions of people deemed poor based on per capita income of US$4.00 per day (World Bank).

Our team is proposing to build alternative fuel diesel stoves (Herein Ecofugees) for boiling and cooking done daily in every household, restaurant, and outdoors throughout Haiti. Ecofugees is conceived on the definite strides made in the technology to using vegetable oils as a replacement for diesel fuel to power cooking stoves. The results indicate that highly saturated oils can be used in a diesel generator to power cooking stoves. This stove 13 consists of a compact diesel generator, powered by reuse vegetable oil, with a tank placed underneath the top of the vessel of the stove. It also contains a small door to control air flow into the stove. The whole system is set-up with fuel line-up the motor, filter, and valve set to keep vegetable oil hot for power. With an estimated life of around 24 to 36 months, and retailing for US$15.00, Ecofugees will be a significant transfer of clean technology intended to reduce the use of charcoal made of wood from trees for residential and commercial boiling and cooking.

Port-au-Prince, with an estimated population of 2,618,894, receives the bulk of Haiti’s charcoal and firewood evaluated at 85 to 90 percent of Haiti’s energy for home and industrial use, with rural firewood consumption estimated at 500 kg per person per year (National Institute for Statistics and Information (IHSI) of Haiti). For instance, “It was found that middle class and rich Haitians in Port-au-Prince consume more charcoal per person than poor Haitians.” (Stevenson, 1989). The World Health Organization (WHO), Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves, academic researchers, and other organizations are carefully examining the relationship between health outcomes and cooking fuels and /cooking practices. It is becoming widely accepted that the vegetable oil Ecofuguees uses as a modern alternative fuel is much less hazardous than charcoal for cooking as well as the biomass stoves and fuels that are harmful.The introduction of this innovative eco-friendly cooking stove, powered with re-used vegetable oil will facilitate the transfer of clean technology intended to lessen the use of charcoal. It will lead to the building ofan infrastructure of eco-industries encompassing distributors, retailers, users, and other stakeholders, such as policymakers and funders. It is intended to benefit the households in Port-au-Prince that use charcoal to cook. It will improve both their social and health outcomes.

A World Bank document, November 2018, states, “Total charcoal sales in Port-au-Prince are approximately US$182 million per year”. In spite of this annual revenue, charcoal making, as an economic factor, lacks any significant multiplier effect to lifting the population out of poverty that the World Bank determines on a per capita income of US$4.00.00 per day. Ecofugees, as a local green economy initiative to leverage economic, environmental, and energy opportunities, recognizes and mitigates the negative outcomes associated with charcoal production as follows: 1) the charcoal making process is both time consuming, low paying, and it involves the participation of whole rural villages. It is primarily done by farmers and working-poor when major cities like Port-au-Prince demand more charcoal (and thus are willing pay higher prices). For working roughly 20 days a charcoal maker may only hope to receive an average of $9.00. A single working person, putting in a full day’s work, will usually gather enough wood to make 19 kilograms of charcoal. After 2-3 weeks’ worth of gathering, it will take an additional 8 days to convert all the wood into charcoal. The process of making charcoal and its use constitute a major risk factor to health of users.

Ecofugees evolved from Gallery Basquiat Boston founded in 2012 to reinforce the local artists seeking to make a living from their craft. It launched Liftoff Boston, a twelve-week incubator conceived to attract local artists who see themselves as a business. Toward this goal, it connected the local artists who became members to live, work, and retail spaces. While working with these members it introduced a clean technology class to teach them how to reduce their carbon footprint, as a first step to mitigate climate change. Eventually, the strategy of Reduce, Reuse, Recycle led to the decision to focus on deforestation, and its corollary issues such as loss of soil, habitat, farm land, species and famine. Doumafis, Team Leader, worked on a design trademark for the company, proposed solution to the probelm, marketing, sale, and social responsibility to preserving little species among us, like Zandolit, a small lizard found in Haiti.

Our solution is conceived on a strategy of no waste to build eco-friendly stoves powered with reused vegetable oil as an alternative fuel for cooking at home, restaurant, and outdoors. In the energy field, our comparative advantage is based on affordability and cleanliness. Our solution will connect the target customers, i.e., farmers engaged in charcoal making, to an infrastructure of suppliers of veggie fuel kit, filter and strainer; grease-stove-certified mechanics; and owners of restaurant, food truck, homes, and outdoors.

Currently, we are in the process of building our baseline statistics, through research of databases, survey, focus groups, interviews, questionnaire, information table, and mobile outreach among the target population that we seek to serve. Toward this goal, we are planning to build a landing page, with register/log-in, to collect user information for analytical purposes. From the results of this analytic, we expect to redefine our outreach, marketing, and supply chain to serve a quarter of Haiti’s population of 8.1 million, which is concentrated in Port-Au-Prince. By the end of calendar year 2022, we will serve nine percent of Port-Au-Prince’s 2,025,000 people that rely on charcoal (evaluated at roughly 0.44 kg per person, per day) for cooking and heating (Agroforestry and Sustainable Resource Conservation in Haiti: A Case Study by Nathan C. McClintock). Our projection for the following four years will be based on increasing our output to meet the existing and future demands (population growth estimated at rate of 2.1 percent) for cooking stoves of ninety-eight percent of Port-Au-Prince’s population. With this trend toward urban migration, and further exhaustion of natural resources as the needs of the population are met, we will scale our service to meet and/or exceed 4.2 million users.

Evaluation is one of the key components of our project. Currently, we are using Excel to collect data informed by our performance goals for tracking and monitoring, i.e., # of interaction, % of user in the population, and user satisfaction on scale of 1 to 5, to generate both quarterly and annual reports to share with the team, donors, investors, as well as other stakeholders. However, within one year, we will start using Google Analytics to the process of measuring our progress toward our impact outcomes. In concrete terms, there are three key impact goals: 1) to connect to the entire middle- upper-class rich Haitians that consume more charcoal per person than poor Haitians. This is an important metric because they are able to afford our cooking stoves to stop using charcoal, 2) to triage the cooking stoves users among the overall urban dwellers, i.e., over six million people, or 64 percent of the total population of Haiti, which increases each year by as many as 133,000, and success stories told about our company.

Dumas F. Lafontant, ML, is Playwright, Photographer, & Proprietor. Patrick Kearney, is a Mechanical Engineer. Gabriel Lafontant, BS, is Senior Software Engineer. Anna Lafontant, BS, is Senior Data Consultant. Edward Ooi, MBA, MIT Sloan School of Management, is Advisor. Charles Hsu, Ph.D., is Advisor.

Our team is committed to the development of workforce in the alternative fuel cooking stoves, to lure away the farmers, and other working-poor in rural villages, making charcoal with wood from trees. We view our team’s happiness, and that of farmers and working-poor, in interdependence to reinforce capacity of farmers and working-poor so that together we can take action on warming and biodiversity loss, and operate a profitable business. Our profitable business is part of reinforcing loop, to attract more farmers and working-poor, launch new businesses, and increase the tax base for the delivery of better service from city. Our team possesses expertise in Economic Development designed to accelerate start-ups. We are led by a collaborative leader, whose vision and perspective are respected and valued by partners at home and abroad. We do not reinvent the wheel, rather we introduce effective approach, like social equity, original concept, and transfer of clean technology to support local economies, while connecting small- medium-enterprises (SME) to opportunities, and resources. We work with individuals, organizations, and companies on strategy, and policy to solve problems at the local level. We advise developers how to address gentrification, create value, and maximize business efficiency and profitability. We connect partner developers and neighborhood stakeholders to help create understanding on the impact of urbanisation on local economies, primarily SMEs, and artists who see themselves as a business. While the outcome is to identify problems and communicate potential solutions, we maintain the process within the partners.

We are an equal opportunity company that has built its cadre of leaders on equity. The ultimate goal is to bridge the income gap.

The current state of affairs shows, there are countries that are affected by flooding, and heat wave, and there are other countries that face famine and drought. In our estimation, based on per capita income, education, and public health, which includes gun violence, within ten to fifteen years, ninety-nine percent of the world’s population will become ecological refugees, having to relocate in-country, in refugee camps, or in the worst-case scenario, left to fend for themselves, while the one percent is actively busy seeking to recreate life elsewhere, somewhere, anywhere in the solar system. It this situation of scattered brain, rather fuzzy picture, which compels us to join the Solve community at MIT because the connection to other solvers that are already working to address the issues that history places on our path as we make our way on the planet.

We will seek to build partnership and support in the area of artificial intelligence, robotic, modeling, as well as finance and investment. The most pressing need is to get accepted. Once this is done, we will be able to communicate this accomplishment for collaboration, information sharing, and resource referral. When anything that happens is communicated, the society will change creatively.

The partial list of organizations that we would like to partner with because of our shared-mission is as follows: Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Observatory of Economic Complexity (MIT OEC)- Data Analysis,GeoCenter of USAID’s Global Development Lab,J/P Haitian Relief Organization “Haiti Takes Root” Initiative,Fuel from the Fields, Michigan Institute of Technology,World Health Organization (WHO), Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves, IUCN: International Union for Conservation of Nature, and US Overseas Private Investment Corporation.

This prize will help alleviate the plight of Haitians internally displaced due to the environmental degradation and its impact on the local economy.

We are interested in any effort that lessens CO2 emission.

It will contribute to eliminating poverty among farmers and working-poor Haitians involved in the process of making charcoal.