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WHAT PROGRESS IS BEING MADE ON CLEAN COOKING?
Rural households
Progress on the transition to clean cooking is tracked through two main meas- ures: i) the access rate (the share of the population with access); ii) and the ac- cess deficit (the total number of people without access). ACCESS RATES Global progress on clean cooking access has been slow, increasing by just 1.4 per- centage points annually between 2010 and 2021. 17 This progress has been heavily concentrated in a small number of the most populous developing countries. 18 Since 2010, roughly 80 percent of the progress in the global access rate comes from just three countries (see Figure 1). By contrast, in the 20 countries with the lowest ac- cess rates, progress has been far slower at below 0.4 percentage points between 2017 and 2021. 19 Today, roughly three quarters (74 percent) of those without access to clean cook- ing are located in 20 countries. In eight of these countries (all located in Africa), less than 10 percent of the population has access to clean fuels and technologies. Historically, there have been major discrepancies between urban and rural areas in access to clean cooking fuels and technologies. Urban households often have more reliable access to the infrastructure required for clean cooking solutions such as the electricity grid and LPG fueling stations. Globally, roughly 88 percent of ur- ban households have access to clean cooking, compared to only 54 percent of ru- ral households. 20 This urban-rural access disparity has been gradually narrowing across every region except for sub-Saharan Africa, where only 7 percent of rural households have access to clean cooking (see Box 1). 21
with access to clean cooking in Africa:
7 %
BOX 1: URBAN VS RURAL ACCESS TO CLEAN COOKING
rates rose from 31 percent to 51 percent, narrow- ing the gap to 35 percentage points. By 2030 it will narrow further to 23 percentage points, if current trends continue. 24 Yet it remains likely that the great- est “last mile” clean cooking challenge will be en- countered in rural areas, where household incomes are lower and biomass can be collected from the environment without direct cost to the consumer. 25
Historically, there have been major discrepancies and between 2000 and 2010 the difference in access to clean cooking technologies between urban and rural areas stood at around 50 percentage points. 22 However, the gap has been narrowing. In urban areas clean cooking access rates rose only slightly over the past decade — from 82 percent in 2010 to 86 percent in 2021. 23 Over the same period rural access
Footnotes on next page
1. THE CLEAN COOKING AGENDA
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