Expressing concern over inefficient and polluting cookstoves which cause severe health problems for millions of women in India, UK Parliamentarian Baroness Verma today said both countries were working together on a project to provide improved cookstoves.
"Cooking on inefficient and polluting cookstoves cause severe health problems for millions of women in India. Collecting fuel puts women and children at risk and limits education opportunities. India and the UK are working together on an innovative project to provide improved cookstoves and economic opportunities to thousands of women," Verma said.
Verma, a member of the House of Lords and junior minister in Department of Energy and Climate Change, visited Tanda village in Amethi to inaugurate a solar micro-grid connection (SMG) for provision of household lighting, along with director general of The Energy and Resources Institute (TERI), R K Pachauri.
"The problem in India is acute as almost 400 million people are without access to electricity and almost twice this number using biomass, often of inferior quality, for cooking on highly inefficient and polluting cookstoves," Pachauri said.
Uttar Pradesh is one of the key states for TERI's initiative of distribution of cookstoves and solar lamps, he said.
Under "Lighting a Billion Lives" initiative, close to 400 villages have been covered in the state through direct interventions touching more than 3,30,000 lives. Similarly, the initiative on cookstoves has reached around 2,131 households in UP, he added.
In Tanda village where Verma and Pachauri visited as part of the Department of International Development (DFID) and TERI's 'Clean Energy Access Partnership' initiatives, they spoke to women groups about their experiences.
The initiative focusses on women and children who are primarily impacted by indoor air pollution from traditional cookstoves and kerosene-based lamps.
