Clean Cooking for All: The Last Mile of Energy Access

Around 2 billion people still rely on traditional fuels for cooking: wood, charcoal and biomass, with significant health, environmental and economic consequences. The burden falls overwhelmingly on the Global South, and disproportionately on women and children. Access programmes have connected large numbers of households, but sustained use has proven harder than initial adoption. Traditional fuel remains free to collect, which sets a difficult benchmark for any alternative that has to be bought. The discussion will focus on the role of each fuel (LPG, piped gas, electricity, biogas) , affordability at both connection and refill, and the distribution reliability that sustains adoption.