#Waste: Goodluck releases £16m for the purchase of clean cook stoves for rural Nigerian women

Since when has these things become so necessary ........a country currently suffering from electrical failure and the fuel problem but PRESIDENT Goodluck Jonathan has rather.  released the sum of N5bn (£16m) to the Federal Ministry of the Environment to enable it purchase clean cook stoves for rural women as part of an empowerment and environmental project.

Designed to be part of a rural women's development project and aimed at improving the environment, the scheme will involve the ministry purchasing the stoves and distributing them. It is expected that the entire project may cost as much as N9.2bn when fully up and running. Environment minister Laurentia Mallam, said that President Jonathan will inaugurate the project today. She added that the stoves will be distributed to women in the rural areas through the state ministries of environment.

Traditionally, Nigeria has had a very weak environmental policy with no clear government guidelines on the best way to cook. Domestically, people use everything ranging from firewood, to kerosene stoves, to gas to cook and with no government controls on emissions, there are no environmental controls.

However, the rising price of petroleum products tends to affect the use of stoves as whenever there is a scarcity of kerosene, their usage drops and the use of firewood increases. Gas usage across Nigeria is very poor and some 23bn cubic feet of gas are being flared in the Niger Delta every year.

Ewah Eleri, the national coordinator of the Nigerian Alliance for Clean Cook Stoves, said: “Around the world today, 4m women die of smoke from the kitchen, which is more than the number of deaths from malaria and hepatitis put together worldwide. In Nigeria, nearly 100,000 lives are lost from smoke, from something as simple and ordinary as cooking."

Last year, President Jonathan's government approved the sum of N9bn for the distribution of 750,000 clean cook stoves and 18,000 wonder bags to Nigerian women in a bid to stop the depletion of forest resources caused by indiscriminate felling of trees. Under the National Clean Cooking Scheme, Nigeria aims to distribute at least 4m clean cook stoves in each of the six geo-political zones as United Nations Development Programme research shows that the country tops the list of nations where women suffer various ailments resulting from the use of firewood.