Four billion people around the world still lack access to clean, efficient, convenient, safe, reliable, and affordable cooking energy, a new report by the World Bank has revealed.
In its State of Access to Modern Energy Cooking Services report, the bank said while around 1.25 billion are considered in transition with access to improved cooking services, other 2.75 billion face significantly higher access barriers.
Using an expanded methodology to provide a more comprehensive measurement of household energy access and cooking solutions, the report finds that the rate of access to modern sources of energy for cooking stands at only 10 per cent inpeople Sub-Saharan Africa, 36 per cent in East Asia, and 56 per cent in Latin America and the Caribbean.
The report builds on the World Bank’s established Multi-Tier Framework (MTF) to provide an in-depth, comprehensive understanding of household cooking-energy needs to inform strategies for adoption of modern energy cooking solutions.
The MTF for cooking is a multidimensional, tiered approach to measuring household access to cooking solutions across six technical and contextual attributes—convenience, affordability, safety, fuel availability, exposure, and efficiency, ranging from Tier 0 (no access) to Tier 5 (full access).
A household is considered to have access to modern energy cooking services (MECS) when their cooking practices meet the MTF Tier 4 or above.
A household whose cooking practices meet MTF Tier 2 or 3 is considered as being in transition with access to improved cooking services.
To achieve universal access to Modern Energy Cooking Services by 2030, the report estimates that approximately $150 billion is needed per year including $39 billion from the public sector to ensure that modern cooking solutions can be afforded by the poorest and; $11 billion by the private sector to install downstream infrastructure for the functioning of modern energy cooking markets.
The remaining $103 billion comes from household purchases of stoves and fuels.
Reaching universal access to improved cooking services by 2030 requires $10 billion per year, including $6 billion from the public sector to fill the affordability gap and the rest by households
