By Isabel Risby, Communications Officer, GeCCo
The first UNEP, AFREC, CCAC Policy Dialogue on Clean Cooking, co-organised with the UNEP CCC, convened government ministries, policymakers, global experts, and private sector representatives from across the energy space to discuss progress, challenges, and opportunities in advancing clean cooking. The session was moderated by Eng. Nickson Bukachi, Senior Policy Officer at the African Energy Commission (AFREC), and James Haselip, Senior Advisor of the UNEP Copenhagen Climate Centre.
The recording link is attached here for reference:
Opening Remarks: Rashid Abdallah, Executive Director, AFREC
The dialogue opened with remarks from Rashid Abdallah, who framed clean cooking as a central component of Africa’s energy and development agenda. He emphasised that clean cooking solutions must reflect the diversity of African households and energy systems, noting that “one size does not fit all.” Rashid outlined the need for a multi-fuel approach, stressing that “we must keep a diverse basket of solutions at the heart of our strategy to ensure practical and immediate impact.”
Rashid highlighted the importance of localising manufacturing and supply chains, explaining that producing clean cooking technologies within Africa can stimulate local economies, create jobs, and strengthen supply resilience. He also acknowledged the significant burden that traditional cooking places on women and girls, particularly in rural areas, and encouraged participants to contribute insights that would help shape a unified African position ahead of upcoming regional and global summits. He closed with the wisdom of Wangari Maathai—“We must all do our part rather than stand by for mere talking”—underscoring the urgency of addressing the challenge faced by the 1 billion people in Africa without access to clean cooking.
UNEP Perspective: Martina Otto, Head of Secretariat, CCAC
Martina Otto delivered remarks on behalf of the UNEP Director, representing the UNEP Regional Office, the UNEP Copenhagen Climate Centre, and the UNEP-convened CCAC. She noted that clean cooking has gained increased political visibility, including its inclusion on the African Union Summit 2026 agenda as a cross-cutting issue tied to health, climate, and development.
Martina referenced the Integrated Assessment of Air Pollution and Climate Change for Sustainable Development in Africa, developed with contributions from over 100 African scientists and institutions. The assessment identified 37 priority measures across five sectors—including residential energy—that could significantly reduce air pollution, improve crop yields, and align with the 1.5°C global warming pathway. Implementing these measures could prevent 880,000 premature deaths annually by 2063.
Martina highlighted clean cooking as one of the most immediate and high-impact interventions in the residential energy sector, pointing to electric cooking as a priority technology and noting the continent’s significant renewable energy potential. She emphasised that cooking represents a consistent and predictable energy load, which can support grid stability and renewable energy integration. Martina introduced the SOLCO partnership, co-led by UNEP-CCC and launched at COP28 as part of the Global Electric Cooking Coalition, which aims to expand solar eCooking solutions across Africa. She also referenced the CCAC’s recent e-cooking challenge, which will inform future activities. Martina closed by encouraging continued collaboration between governments, the private sector, and development partners to accelerate progress.
Research Insights: Prof. Ed Brown, Research Director, MECS
Prof. Ed Brown provided an overview of global and regional clean cooking trends. He noted that somewhere between 3.5 and 4 billion people have no or only partial access to clean cooking, highlighting the scale of the challenge. He also emphasised that polluting fuels themselves are becoming increasingly expensive, noting that this not only reinforces the need to reduce the cost of clean alternatives but also reflects the reality that, as the environmental crisis intensifies, fewer of these traditional fuels will be available for families to purchase.
Prof. Ed Brown referenced the Clean Cooking Challenge Report: https://mecs.org.uk/resources/afrec-report/ developed with AFREC, which establishes a baseline for tracking progress and identifies country-specific issues needed to design evidence-based programmes. He stressed that rigorous analysis remains essential, pushing back against the myth that the sector simply needs funding for stove distribution—noting that if solutions were straightforward, “the clean cooking challenge would have been solved 30 years ago.” He described the rapid evolution of electric cooking, noting major improvements in appliance efficiency and compatibility with diverse cuisines, and highlighted that eCooking can be affordable when the right conditions are in place, including efficient appliances and appropriate tariff structures that make it viable for many households.
Prof. Ed Brown highlighted the growth of the Global Electric Cooking Coalition, now at 37 members, and pointed to promising developments including AfDB’s $15 million approval for eCooking initiatives in East Africa and the ASCENT programme working alongside MECS, integrating electric cooking into World Bank energy access programming. He outlined emerging financing mechanisms including on-bill financing, which enables households to repay appliance costs gradually through their electricity bills, and shared findings from mini grid studies showing that integrating electric cooking can shorten payback periods and improve financial viability. He closed with a clear message: “we should not be financing any energy access initiatives without fully considering the opportunities for electric cooking to drive consumption.”
Guidance for Policymakers: Sandra Cavalieri, Household Energy Hub Coordinator, CCAC
Sandra Cavalieri introduced new guidance available through the Air Quality Management Exchange Platform. The platform provides four sector-specific guidance packages, including a 10-step pathway for expanding access to electric cooking—designed for air quality managers and policymakers seeking to progress toward WHO air quality guidelines. The guidance spans the full process, from baseline assessments through to institutional arrangements, planning and design, and policy integration. She encouraged participants to explore the curated resources here: https://aqmx.org/content/aqmx-sectoral-guidance-expanding-access-e-cooking and to contact the CCAC Secretariat for further engagement.
Panel Discussion: National and Industry Perspectives
Senegal: Mr. Doudou Diouf, Head of the Domestic Fuel Division at the Director General of Hydrocarbons at the Ministry of Energy, Petroleum, and Mines
Mr. Diouf provided an overview of Senegal’s clean cooking landscape, noting that the country continues to rely heavily on wood and charcoal, with 1.6 million tonnes of wood and more than 700,000 tonnes of charcoal consumed annually for household cooking. Senegal’s clean cooking agenda has evolved from a collection of environment-focused projects into a revised national strategy built around a multi-fuel approach. The strategy, first developed in 2016 and subsequently updated, reflects the need to expand energy access as a foundation for modern energy cooking.
Mr. Diouf stressed that e-cooking cannot scale without electricity access, which is why Senegal is prioritising energy access and pursuing tariff reform—including efforts to reduce electricity costs through gas-to-power generation—with the aim of making e-cooking more affordable. He acknowledged ongoing funding constraints and appliance affordability challenges, while highlighting progress through the national biogas programme and private sector innovation. He emphasised that achieving universal access requires long-term planning integrating gas-to-power, renewables, energy efficiency, and social connectivity, and that expanding electricity access—particularly in rural areas—is a prerequisite for enabling households to transition to modern cooking solutions.
Tanzania: Eng. Benizeth Kapu Duguru, Energy Engineer, Clean Cooking Unit, Ministry of Energy
Eng. Benizeth, working in Tanzania’s newly formed Clean Cooking Unit, provided an overview of the country’s recent progress on electric cooking. He outlined the National Clean Cooking Strategy (2024), a 10-year roadmap assigning clear roles across government, backed by high-level political support including from President Samia Suluhu Hassan. The country’s Energy Compact aims for 80% clean cooking access by 2034, with electric cooking positioned as a natural progression supported by ongoing national electrification efforts. With 12,318 villages now electrified, the next priority is awareness raising to help households understand the benefits of cooking with electricity.
Eng. Benizeth thanked MECS for piloting the on-bill financing, which allows households to pay for e-cooking appliances through their electricity bills, and noted that the Ministry is exploring opportunities to scale this model with the Rural Energy Agency. He concluded that clean cooking and electrification are not competing agendas but complementary ones, advancing most effectively when sequenced together.
Private Sector: Peter Scott, CEO and Founder, BURN
Peter Scott leads Africa’s largest clean cooking company, with over 6 million appliances sold across the continent. He noted that BURN has already deployed around 60,000 IoT‑enabled electric cooking kits and plans to distribute an additional 150,000 over the coming year. A major enabler of this growth has been the strong potential for carbon financing, which provides substantial revenue opportunities and has attracted investor interest, alongside grant support from NEFCO, DIT/UK Catalyst, and the European Investment Bank. He noted that BURN has also reinvested nearly $20 million of profits from its biomass business into developing electric cooking solutions, requiring significant R&D across hardware, software, firmware, business models, and behaviour change.
Peter highlighted that induction cooking is now commercially viable in several East and Southern African markets where electricity is cheaper than LPG and charcoal, while acknowledging that parts of West Africa remain more challenging. He noted that many African grids are increasingly renewable, making electric cooking a more resilient and climate-aligned option than LPG. On carbon finance, he stressed that—contrary to recent concerns—the market is currently strong, and that high-quality, well-designed e-cooking projects continue to offer robust opportunities for scaling clean cooking access.
Kenya: Irene Wanjohi, Principal Sales Growth Officer, Kenya Power
Irene Wanjohi of Kenya Power—which supplies electricity to more than nine million customers nationwide—emphasised that electricity access and cooking access must progress together. With Kenya’s National eCooking Strategy targeting 10% household adoption by 2028, she described Kenya Power’s close collaboration with government on a national e‑cooking tariff study with MECS, exploring the feasibility and design of a dedicated tariff. Irene also outlined the utility’s role in advancing institutional e‑cooking through the national school feeding programme, working with county teams to ensure schools using electric cooking are protected from unplanned outages.
A major focus for Kenya Power is awareness raising. Through live demonstrations, energy use monitoring, cooking competitions, and blind taste tests, Kenya Power is actively challenging long-standing myths around taste, cost, and cultural suitability. Kenya Power and partners such as MECS have established e-cooking hubs across the country, alongside a mobile kitchen that brings demonstrations to remote communities. Looking ahead, Irene noted that IoT-enabled appliances could be transformative for tariff design and demand monitoring.
Audience Q&A
In the final segment, Prof. Ed Brown responded to questions on affordability under on‑bill financing and grid reliability. He explained that while on‑bill financing adds a small recurring cost, its purpose is to remove the upfront barrier, and for many households this is offset by reduced spending on charcoal, LPG, or other polluting fuels. He noted that similar models, such as Kenya’s “Stima Loan” for grid connections, have worked well in the past. On grid reliability, he acknowledged challenges in countries like Zambia but stressed that e‑cooking should be integrated into comprehensive national energy planning. By ensuring future investments in generation and distribution account for rising demand—and recognising that efficient appliances can help manage load—he argued it is far more effective to embed e‑cooking within system planning rather than treat it as a standalone issue.
Closing Reflections: Daniel Chimaobi, Senior Programme Officer, AFREC
In the closing summary, Daniel Chimaobi highlighted Africa’s clean cooking access rate of just 35% and the enormous opportunity this presents. Recurring themes across speakers included the need for a diverse basket of solutions tailored to national contexts, the importance of political will as demonstrated by Tanzania, the integration of clean cooking into national energy planning as shown by Senegal, and the growing role of electric cooking in East Africa where it is increasingly cost‑competitive. He also underscored the significance of continued R&D around tariffs and appliance performance, as well as the importance of sociocultural acceptance—illustrated by Kenya Power’s community demonstrations and taste‑testing. The session closed with a call to carry these insights forward and continue building practical, context‑driven solutions for clean cooking across Africa.