Elieser Rodriguez emerges blackened from the thick smoke of burning pyres slowly transforming the limbs of mangroves into charcoal -- a livelihood much maligned by environmental and climate campaigners in Panama. He says he has no other choice for a living. About 200 families in El Espave, on the banks of the Bahia de Chame, a large bay, work in the production of mangrove charcoal, which they sell to pizzerias and restaurants. IMAGES AND SOUNDBITES