Clean Cooking

Context

Around 3 billion people do not have access to clean cooking solutions. Instead, they must rely on burning traditional biomass or polluting fuels, which has severe consequences. 

Indoor air pollution from the use of traditional fuels for cooking causes millions of deaths annually. The estimated cost worldwide from the use of traditional fuels for cooking is approximately USD 2.4 trillion each year, which accounts for the adverse impacts on health, the climate, lost productivity and the environment, including deforestation.

Meanwhile, there is a chronic lack of finance flowing to the clean cooking sector. Finance commitments remain far below the estimated investment needed to achieve universal access by 2030. 

Clean cooking for all hinges on catalytic public finance, enabling domestic policies that support sustainable clean cooking value chains and consumer support that promotes demand. This calls for cross-sector coordination and broad consensus to make access to clean cooking a priority at global and country levels.

Expanding access to modern, clean cooking solutions will also need diversified responses tailored to local contexts and market conditions, while applying existing technologies that address factors like affordability and reliability. 

Activities

• Advocate for governments and partners to raise ambition and prioritize access to clean cooking.
• Inform the clean cooking sector’s investment and decision-making by providing reliable data on consumer preferences and usage of different clean cooking solutions so that resources are allocated to the most viable solutions.
• Quantify the social, environmental and economic benefits of clean cooking access to help policymakers identify the far-reaching impacts of clean cooking investment.
• Provide technical input to the clean cooking sector stakeholders’ research and projects.
• Identify and cultivate opportunities to unlock finance through existing or planned initiatives (e.g. results-based financing).

Projects and initiatives

• Clean Cooking Data for All
• Integrated Energy Plan - Nigeria
   

Photo credit: Romana Manpreet