Now that we have a national clean cooking policy

Now that the Federal Executive Council has finally approved the long-awaited National Clean Cooking Policy, which was launched in Abuja a fortnight ago, there is no excuse for us to drop the ball. We must push our nation to end cooking energy poverty and promote public health and environmental sustainability. The policy aims to expand access to clean energy solutions for cooking to all households and institutions in Nigeria by 2030.

The goal of universal access by 2030 will help Nigeria improve health, create jobs, build livelihoods, protect the environment and help families, institutions and businesses save time and money by promoting of clean cooking solutions. In line with the Energy Transition Plan, the NCCP’s goal will lay the foundation for achieving the federal government’s long-term vision of a carbon-neutral future for clean cooking by 2060.

For the avoidance of doubt, when we talk about clean cooking, we mean people who use cleaner fuels and energy efficient modern stoves. Modern and clean cooking fuels are fuels with very low emissions of pollutants when burned. Examples include biogas (a renewable fuel produced from organic material such as food or animal waste), liquefied petroleum gas (also called cooking gas), electricity, ethanol, natural gas, solar energy and pellets used in specialist biomass stoves (from animal manure, rice husks, etc.).

We cannot afford to let this vision take the place of other national plans that never saw the light of day, because it is fundamental and linked to almost all parts of our national life. In fact, it is in line with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. We are running out of time to achieve SDG7 – ensuring access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all – by 2030.

But the sad reality of Nigeria today is that removing subsidies on petrol and electricity is pushing us further away from achieving this goal. For example, one kilogram of liquefied petroleum gas (also known as cooking gas) sells for about N1,200 while N280 was sold a few years ago. Many households that previously used cooking gas have now returned to using wood and charcoal. The impact on our society can only be imagined; More trees are now being cut down and our ecosystem is exposed to the vagaries of climate change. Once again, the energy transition in cooking becomes a mirage.

Another way to look at it is that Nigeria, with the largest population in Africa, needs to lead the way in addressing access to clean cooking. Global experts note that countries like China, India and Indonesia have made commendable progress in spreading clean cooking technologies. Yet in sub-Saharan Africa, there are a growing number of people without access to cleaner stoves and fuels, largely because population growth is outpacing gains in access. They confirm that this could hinder broader development efforts, making it imperative to make clean cooking a policy priority.

Now we have a policy, with a number of proposed measures to achieve the goals. The question is whether the government will find the spirit to maintain the pace. Will the country be able to increase LPG supply to five million tons per year by 2030? What specific incentive will it inject into the market to drive an ecosystem that will enable the injection of ten million cylinders into Nigerian homes and institutions by 2030? What structural and administrative adjustments will the Federal Government make to promote biogas development to reach at least three percent of Nigerian homes and institutions by 2030?

My view is that this should not be an isolated policy. It should include all government development institutions, and citizens should be purposefully educated about it. To be honest, clean cooking has never enjoyed far-reaching government attention. In fact, we don’t know if this is due to the nomenclature, but it is actually surprising that people don’t seem to be making the connection between climate change and climate change. Hence the toil and fuss that characterized the process before the policy became reality.

Secondly, given that the prevailing removal of subsidies on petrol and electricity has had a negative impact on the energy sector, a number of high-level decisions need to be made before this new policy has an immediate impact on the national polity. Ewah Eleri, the Chairman of the Board of Trustees of the Nigerian Alliance for Clean Cooking, believes that to achieve the objectives of the policy and the Nigerian Energy Transition Plan, government and other stakeholders must protect the local market and then provide a targeted subsidy need to set. system to absorb the economic pressure on poor households.

He explained: “Firstly, LPG produced in Nigeria should be priced in naira. This will protect the poor from the vagaries of the fluctuating exchange rate. Secondly, the government should honor its policy by imposing a domestic obligation on all companies producing LPG in Nigeria. We cannot export cooking gas if the local market does not have sufficient supply. Third, as these fundamentals are corrected, the federal government and development partners must develop smart and targeted subsidies, as is being done in India, where the poorest households will receive cooking gas vouchers. This will save lives, reduce the financial burden on poor households and help the federal government meet its climate change obligations.”

Third, having observed market realities in our climate, I am convinced that carbon finance is a crucial low-hanging fruit that we can immediately benefit from – I said the same thing in this column last week. It is a good thing that the new policy includes the carbon market. The Federal Government confirms that it will facilitate access to international carbon markets for the purchase of certified emission reductions from biogas production and energy efficient technology implementations. This is the path we must take for a developing economy like ours. But the question is: how long will we wait before we arrive?

Christopher Obi, CEO of Nenu Engineering, a manufacturer of clean cooking appliances, told me: “There is only one thing that limits the industry (in Nigeria) and that even most developers of CO2 projects are skeptical. The Nigerian position on Article 6 (the paradigm for regulating the global carbon market, based on the Paris Climate Agreement) is not so clear. That’s why people don’t want to come up with investments because if they take their money and tomorrow Nigeria is making its case: they may be losing money. Therefore, I am making the point that if Nigeria could come up with a clear position on Article 6, it will give the investors the opportunity to decide to invest.

“The government is already doing something, but it must take a position quickly. Ghana is light years ahead of Nigeria, and Kenya is the same. There will soon be a clean cooking forum in France, in collaboration with the Tanzanian government and the International Energy Agency. So even Tanzania has taken a strong stance on clean cooking. This is the kind of attitude the international community wants to see from Nigeria. If you have a government that takes a clear stance on clean cooking and communicates this stance, then you have property developers moving into the country. International development partners and even financiers are coming. That’s all we need. We don’t need a government to look after us; we just want them to take their stand. Once that attitude is there, everything else follows.”