Woodfuel energy supply to rural India : problems & perspectives

India, in the present time, is passing through an acute shortage of fuelwood in the rural sector where three quarters of her population live. To solve this \Second Energy Crisis\" of India there have evolved several technical solutions of which the rural energy plantation or the Social Forestry Plantation Programme is the most important one. Various physical financial and technical constraints related to these programmes can be solved by technical or scientific means. But the real issues of the problem lie deeper enmeshed in the Indian social system which is highly complex in nature. There are enormous temptations to tackle the solution of the problem through technical means but this is only a partial remedy. What is more important is the forming of policy and its implementation through administrative mechanisms. This is because any attempts to apply only technical innovation in the existing unequal society of India have always resulted in failure. In spite of increased production of food grains through the \"green revolution\" the poorer sections are still starving - because they have no access to these food grains. Similarly through technical means there will be enormous generation of fuelwood resources - but that does not guarantee that the poor will have it. What is needed is a radical approach to evolve good policy through which the \"poorest of the poor\" will have access to this resource. Until that is done rural India's energy problem will remain as it is."