Over 360,000 clean burning stove products will be distributed to households countrywide over a period of 7 years. The distribution will be carried out by UpEnergy, a Rwandan Household cook stove carbon company.The project aims at facilitating the transition from inefficient traditional stoves to improved high-efficiency and clean burning cooking stoves to mainly rural areas.It has started up with Karongi District among other areas in the Western province.According to Erik Wurster, the project’s Managing Director, more than 95 percent of the population in Rwanda cooks on primitive stoves fuelled by wood or charcoal which are a danger to people’s health and the environment.“These stoves are 50 to 70 percent more effective compared to the existing ones.We have so far distributed 35 outside Kibuye for testing purposes, to seehow effective they are. They are currently used in Ghana, Mali, Tanzania and Uganda,” he said.Dirty cooking technology causes non-communicable diseases such as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, asthma, lunch cancer.Globally, indoor air pollution from smoky kitchens kills more people than both malaria and tuberculosis. Wurster, noted that UpEnergy will address barriers to use of clean burning stoves by leveraging carbon finance to build distribution channels that sell household energy products at affordable prices.He also said they are targeting the most vulnerable population and will thus identify an affordable price. They will start with the Western Province and scale up to other parts of the country.The project will also claim carbon credits from the emissions reduction from improved efficiency of the cook stoves.Wurster said discussions are still underway with Rwanda Environmental Management Authorities to gain authorisation
