Homs: firewood prices soar in rebel held areas

Reporting by Maher Radhwan; Translation by Yusra Ahmed

HOMS (Zaman Al Wasl)- Syrians are about to face the 3rd winter under severe lack of fuel and electricity what mean a another cold and hard winter.

Under those hard conditions, Syrians found no option apart from firewood to use for cooking and heating, where people are now trying to secure the amount of this material, which started to become more expensive and prices of wood fireplaces almost increase 3 folds.

“Firewood’s sales increased to 15 folds this year because of high demand, and working in logging has noticeably increased” a firewood’s trader told Zaman al-Wasl.

He added that he needed to employ 20 workers this year in his workshop o cover the work load, while he use to run the workshop with his son only.

A woodsman revealed that firewood’s traders have raised their prices when they noticed the high demand for the material.

A resident in Talbiseh in Homs calculated that an avarage family would need at least 6 litres of oil which has become SP.250 for a litre, means SP 50 thousand a month, which is far out of their ability to cover.

Mustafa Sulaiman , an agriculture engineer estimated that each family would need 2-3 tons of firewood during this winter, therefore a family could spend SP.50 thousand, as the prices jumped from SP.8,000 to 25,000 for a ton.

Firewood’s’ fireplaces came back to market with high demand on it, as prices jumped from SP.1500 to SP.4000.

Moreover, many people turned their oil fireplaces into firewood ones.

“Firewood trade is profitable, as the only expenses needed are for transportations and oil to run sawmills”.

 A woodsman revealed and added that some trees make one ton of firewood, while others, especially the old one could make 2 tons. He expressed his fears that Syrian could run out of forests if the situation and war continues for a long time.

On the other hand, a firewood trader did not find a problem in cutting trees for making firewood, as he considered that human being was the most important value, and people need source to warm themselves and cook to stay alive at least.