ANNOUNCEMENTS
Cooking is a vital basic activity carried out in every household as it provides us with food to drive us daily. However, it is known that in many Indian rural households, this activity is not so friendly to the health of primary cook & family members, if the cooking activity is unclean.
This study is an attempt to understand about different possible clean cooking solutions/options mainly improved cookstoves, solar cookers, biogas & LPG for households of rural India & the drivers & barriers that determine the ease of transition to clean cooking.
Choices in a society are often determined by the social & demographic characteristics (sociodemographic) like economic status, family size, educational background, age, marital status etc. & can help to reveal tendency of a society towards a particular technology or movement & so is the case when introduced to new clean cooking technologies.
An effort is made to understand sociodemographic at Mahalpada village in Gujarat through primary data collection (questionnaire & surveys) & understand its impact on selection of a particular clean technology for cooking. This is backed by information collected from different case studies on clean cooking done with an aim to monitor success of different clean cooking programs at level of rural households in India.
Clean cooking as of now is driven by global consciousness to reduce local air pollution & effects of it on the primary cook & family members.
Efforts in direction to promote clean cooking has been since early 1980’s, however the effectiveness of the efforts so made can be quantified only in terms of the levels of use after the installations. The levels of use/non-use are determined by different factors that can be either a driver or a barrier in transition to clean cooking. On the basis of the study, these factors are summarized at the end to understand the things that are ignored & should be considered for improving levels of use of clean cooking solutions & thus improve its levels of diffusion.
Keywords: Clean cooking, sociodemographic, perceptions, feasibility, Air quality
