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WHAT IS CLEAN COOKING AND WHY DOES IT MATTER?
3 MILLION by household air pollution: Premature deaths per year caused
Globally, approximately 2.1 billion people depend on firewood and other solid biomass, coal or kerosene as their primary cooking fuel. 2 The continued use of these fuels generates a set of adverse public health, environmental and socio- economic consequences that have been extensively studied. A transition to clean cooking reduces these damages by moving towards cooking fuels and technologies that meet the World Health Organization’s (WHO) global air quality guidelines. Accomplishing this transition encompasses a wide range of options, including high efficiency biomass cookstoves, biogas, alcohol fuels such as ethanol, natural gas, liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) and on- and off-grid electricity (e-cooking). PUBLIC HEALTH The harm caused by traditional cooking methods can be divided into a number of categories. Exposure to household air pollution is a leading risk factor for a broad range of health conditions, including childhood pneumonia, chronic obstruc- tive pulmonary disorder, ischemic heart disease, stroke and lung cancer. 3 Through these conditions, household air pollution is estimated to cause more than three million premature deaths per year, including nearly a quarter of a million deaths of children under five. 4 In many parts of the world cooking tasks fall disproportion- ately on women and girls, making them particularly vulnerable to inhaling harmful fumes. Household smoke is also linked to maternal health challenges, including an increased risk of stillbirth and low birth weight. Household cooking is also the lead- ing cause of childhood poisoning through the accidental ingestion of kerosene and of severe burn injuries. Altogether, an estimated 86 million healthy life years were lost because of household air pollution in 2019, with the greatest burden falling on women in low-income settings. 5 That exceeds the 79 million healthy life years lost to road traffic accidents in the same year. 6
2 IEA (2024), SDG 7: Data and Projections, https://www.iea.org/reports/sdg7-data-and-projections
3 Smith, K, and Pillarisetti, A (2017), Household Air Pollution from Solid Cookfuels and Its Effects on Health, 3rd ed., https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30212117/; Clean Cooking Alliance (2022), Air Pollution, Health and Clean Cooking, Health Fact Sheet, https://cleancooking.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/CCA-Health- Factsheet-ENGLISH.pdf 4 IEA (2023), A Vision for Clean Cooking Access for All, https://www.iea.org/reports/a-vision-for-clean- cooking-access-for-all 5 WHO, Household aid pollution, December 2023, https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/ household-air-pollution-and-health 6 WHO Global Health Observatory: DALYs estimates 2000-2019, https://www.who.int/data/gho/data/themes/ mortality-and-global-health-estimates/global-health-estimates-leading-causes-of-dalys
1. THE CLEAN COOKING AGENDA
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