FAO at the Summit on Clean Cooking in Africa

The International Energy Agency (IEA) organized the Summit on Clean Cooking in Africa at UNESCO headquarters, in Paris, with the goal of making 2024 a turning point for progress on ensuring clean cooking access for all.  

The Summit invited global leaders to join the call to make 2024 the pivotal year for addressing the lack of clean cooking in Africa. 

By gathering heads of government, ministers, business leaders and financiers, the Summit aimed to build a wider coalition of support for this critical issue, mobilize more financial support and discuss the action-orientated outputs needed to spark progress on clean cooking. 

FAO Brussels Director, Raschad Al-Khafaji, participated at the Summit representing the Organization. 

Today, nearly four in five Africans still cook their meals over open fires and traditional stoves, using wood, charcoal, animal dung, and other polluting fuels. This has dire impacts on health, gender equality and the environment, with women and children bearing the consequences.  

FAO’s work on clean cooking 

FAO has ample experience in promoting clean cooking solutions through related projects in Sub-Saharan Africa and other regions, promoting clean cooking solutions that involve both local and global actions.  

The Organization works to speed up the shift to clean cooking fuels and technologies in Africa, helping households use clean cooking technologies while making them more resilient to climate change. 

The adoption of renewable and efficient technologies for clean cooking, including electricity and bioenergy-based solutions, such as biogas, micro-gasification and bioethanol is key in that respect. 

Furthermore, in the context of the Global Bioenergy Partnership project, FAO has highlighted that in Sub-Saharan African countries the adoption of micro-gasifiers helps to reduce: pressure on local forests, time spent by women and girls in collecting woody biomass,  and emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG) and other indoor air pollutants to which women and children are otherwise exposed.  

Additionally, FAO is developing national dialogues on bioethanol for clean cooking fuel in some countries in Africa and Asia as part of the Global Bioenergy Partnership (GBEP) project.