
Better option: The energy-efficient stoves are better for people and the environment
Cooking over an open fire was hazardous for Achol’s health and the environment
Andrew Ewoku
For years, Achol Cyier Rehan, a cook at Ajong Primary School in South Sudan, spent hours every week in a cramped, smoky kitchen toiling over a large fire stand, preparing food for 300 pupils. With every breath, she inhaled smoke, ignoring the uncomfortable feeling in her chest.
But, everything changed a few months ago when ForAfrika swapped out the old open fireplace for a stove that is designed to cook more cleanly and swiftly.
Ajong Primary School is one of the schools benefitting from the feeding programme implemented by ForAfrika in partnership with the World Food Programme (WFP).
Waste of time and energy
As well as pollution, concerns had been raised over the time taken to prepare food at most of the schools on the programme. Under normal circumstances learners should be served their meals before midday. However, most schools had been struggling with this requirement and it was attributed to a shortage of firewood and poor cooking methods.
The new stoves, which have two rounded concrete fire pits, use less wood to produce the heat necessary to cook the meals used feed the children. The insulated pots used contain heat for longer.
“The stove is efficient; we are now able prepare the food within three hours. If we start food preparation at 8 am, food will be ready before 11am. We used to take almost five hours to prepare the food for the children,” said Achol, who is pleased with the upgrade.
“Apart from reducing the cooking time, we are also using less firewood. ForAfrika and WFP should construct this type of stove in all the schools,’’ she said.
Global movement
The cooking stoves are part of a decades-long global movement to displace open-fire cooking, which can be significant sources of climate-warming emissions and hazardous indoor air pollution. Although the stoves are still not as clean as gas or electric appliances, they are an improvement for people who rely on burning wood, charcoal, or other forms of biomass.
To date, ForAfrika has constructed 30 energy-efficient stoves in South Sudan. But, making the switch to cleaner cooking stoves has been difficult. As of 2022, about a third of the global population still doesn’t have full access to clean fuels and technology for cooking, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO).
The WHO says that exposure to smoke and other pollutants from household cooking fires is linked to an estimated 3.2 million premature deaths annually around the world and remains one of the main drivers of pollution-related disease and death in Africa.
Fortunately for Achol, there is now a lot less smoke in her kitchen.
Andrew Ewoku is Communications Specialist in South Sudan