Switching to clean cooking transforms lives. It improves health, protects the climate and environment, empowers women and helps consumers save time and money.

Worldwide, air pollution is the leading environmental health risk. This risk is substantial for families without access to clean cooking. Every year, many people, mainly women and children, die prematurely from smoke-related illnesses. Cleaner, modern stoves and fuels can reduce emissions and the risk of household air pollution and smoke-related diseases. Clean cooking can save lives.

• Creating time for other tasks

In many countries, households use wood and charcoal as their main cooking fuel. Collecting wood is an especially time-consuming task for women and children. This is time that could be used for income-generating activities and education. Collecting wood is also physically demanding and can put women in vulnerable positions. Clean cooking provides a solution to these problems. It empowers women and allows children to spend time on their education.

• Reducing deforestation and forest degradation

Besides this, clean cooking is important as it reduces deforestation and forest degradation. Wood is often harvested at a rate quicker than the growth of trees. The production of charcoal is especially problematic as it is the main fuel source in many rapidly-expanding urban and peri-urban areas. Switching to clean cooking methods reduces the negative environmental impacts of fuelwood and charcoal.

• Saving money

If everyone switched to clean cooking methods, it would save the world a lot of money. Clean cooking reduces fuel needs, thus reducing the burden on families.

Introducing clean cooking has a significant positive impact on climate change. Globally, many people depend on polluting, open fires or inefficient stoves to cook their food. Inefficient burning of fuels such as wood, charcoal, coal, crop residue, and inefficient stoves produces climate-warming gases and pollutants. Cooking this way releases greenhouse gases (GHGs) like carbon dioxide and short-lived climate pollutants (SLCPs).

• Fuelwood

Africa, nearly many people rely on fuelwood for cooking. It is the most commonly used solid fuel. Burning fuelwood produces CO2 emissions. Also, around 30% of the fuelwood harvested globally is unsustainable as it is harvested quicker than the growth of trees. This leads to forest degradation and reduces forests' ability to absorb CO2. Fuelwood accounts for 2% of climate-damaging emissions worldwide.

• Black carbon

The most significant SLCP that traditional cooking practices release is black carbon or soot. The black carbon particles absorb sunlight and warm the atmosphere. Black carbon is an important contributor to climate warming. Per unit of mass, the warming impact of black carbon is up to 1,500 times stronger than CO2.

Globally, 25% of black carbon emissions come from household cooking, heating and lighting. In many Asian and African countries, household cooking accounts for 60% to 80% of black carbon emissions. Black carbon only stays in the atmosphere for a few days. This is much shorter than carbon dioxide or other climate change pollutants. So, removing black carbon from dirty cooking provides a possible quick win in the effort to combat climate change.