Perception of artisans towards bamboo preservation for improved product durability in Uganda

Bamboo continues to attract attention globally as a sustainable material and is used in many applications. However, the quality of bamboo products in Uganda remains poor and cannot compete in the local and international markets. Bamboo's low product quality is associated with poor raw material processing and limited preservation methods, which lead to the short service life of the products due to its susceptibility to bio-deterioration and degradation. To cope with the above, artisans in Uganda apply various preservation methods depending on their knowledge and available resources. In this paper, the authors seek to determine the methods used by the artisans to preserve bamboo, understand the background of their intention to preserve, and their perception towards bamboo preservation. The Theory of Planned Behaviour was used as the main framework to understand artisans' perceptions towards the intention to preserve bamboo. A cross-sectional survey with 186 randomly selected artisans working with bamboo was conducted across three agroecological zones presumed to be Uganda's main bamboo growing areas. The study reported 13 available bamboo species, with the artisans exploiting mainly three of these species. Most artisans (86%) were aware of the need to preserve bamboo, with 67.4% practising bamboo preservation. The artisans use different methods and chemicals for preservation, i.e. leaching (17%), smoking (14%), soaking in crude lake salt (31%), boric acid and borax solutions (20%), surface application (16%), and pressure treatment (1%). Ordinal logistic regression was used to model artisans’ intention to engage in bamboo preservation. Attitude and subjective norms were the psychological factors that significantly influenced artisans’ intention to preserve bamboo. Interventions that increase benefits accrued from preserved bamboo can improve artisans’ attitude and subjective norms and enhance their intention to engage in bamboo preservation.