Using Solar Energy for Cooking Fuel in Kenya
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Solar Energy For Cooking Fuel Project August 2008
By Dr Koki Muli-Kinagwi - Ag Director, AfriAfya, August 06, 2008 06:15 PM
The previous solar cooking demonstration was conducted on Thursday the 20th of September 2007 to a group of 45 women in Mitaboni location, Machakos District in Eastern Province of Kenya. Jacqueline and Rose who are Solar Cooking Representatives (SCOREPS) and Stella Odaba of Solar Cookers International in partnership with AfriAfya conducted the demonstration. After the demonstration, six cookits were donated to group leaders from the participants present.
This constituted the first phase of the project whereby beneficiaries are introduced to the technology. The next phase involved training local representatives drawn from the 15 Community based organizations (CBO’s) on the production of Cookits. The purpose of this training is to equip these women with skills to enable them promote solar cooking among community members as well as basic entrepreneurial skills to enable the new SCOREPS start cookits business. This training can now be conducted as additional funds of $878.21 were received this year thanks to you all. The training will take two (2) days and we anticipate having about thirty (30) Mitaboni women being trained.
During one of our field activities we identified another area where solar cooking technology would be ideal. This area is called Kilibasi and is located about 514 kilometers from Nairobi towards the Coastal Region, Southwest Kenya. Kilibasi was once a forest but due to charcoal burning vast lands have been reduced to deplorable state with little or no vegetation. In this region there is one (1) primary school whose student population density is dependent on the availability of lunch. When the school administration can afford to have lunch served the number of students can rise to about 500 and when there is none it drops to even 150 students. The lunch served is sometimes plain rice or crushed maize. The head teacher explained that the older girls in upper primary have to miss some lessons so that they can cook for the rest of the school.
The solar cooking technology would be excellent for this region and specifically for the school as it’s generally a hot and dry place. Also as the technology is such that the food is set in the sun and left to cook, the girls will be free to continue with the day’s lessons without interruption. When we get additional funds from you, we will take the solar cooking demonstration to Kilibasi Primary School and proceed to donate the cookits to them. We also hope to make a training video on the production and use of cookits that can be used to tutor similar groups.
We thank all our donors for making this additional training possible and a comprehensive update with plenty of pictures will be made soon after this training scheduled for 18th to 22nd August 2008.
Empowering these women with new skills will not only help them to prepare meals for their families, but will also help free up time spent looking for firewood for other life-improving activities. Also, providing solar cooking for the school at Kilibasi will ensure that the children get an education and at least one meal a day.
But for this to happen, we do need your help. So please keep those funds coming.
Warming up to the sun: Mitaboni women introduced to solar cooking
By Ann Thuo - Information Officer, September 27, 2007 06:03 PM
Attachments:
Training in solar cooking set to improve the lives of Kenyan rural families
By Ann Thuo - Information Officer, August 02, 2007 07:17 PM
This July, we received our first donation to the solar energy for cooking fuel project in Kenya. With this money, we are planning to conduct an initial demonstration on solar cooking. In this, we will partner with Solar Cookers International; an organization that has done wonderful work of promoting solar cooking among rural communities in Kenya.
Two Maasai women from Kajiado in Kenya, who are part of a group of women that has already undergone training on solar cooking through Solar Cookers International, will conduct the exposure session. Popularly known as SCOREPS (Solar Cookers Representatives) in solar cooking circles, the women have been making solar cookers known as ‘cookits’. The ‘cookits’ are not only simple to make, but also produce delicious meals. The women are also earning an income from making and selling the solar ‘cookits’. We hope that the present beneficiaries of our solar energy project will experience similar benefits once they receive the full training.
A couple of weeks ago, I was on the road heading to Mitaboni to visit the project beneficiaries. My mission there was to discuss with the women about their expectations of the trainings. As always, they were ecstatic and can’t wait to get exposed to solar cooking.
During my visit, I happened to be at a local school during lunch and could not help notice pupils scattered all over the compound enjoying their favourite meal of maize and beans, which is provided hot at the school. Although it may appear apparent that children should get a meal and a hot one during lunch, this is far from it for a host of many other children in Mitaboni. Most mothers in the project group were almost in tears as they narrated bitterly how their children, on many occasions, had to go back to school hungry. ‘Our children have come home expecting to eat only to find that we were still out looking for firewood to make them a meal’, they lamented. But there is hope that this might soon be a thing of the past for Mitaboni families once the project takes off.
The only sad thing is that we are currently experiencing very cold weather in Kenya with the nice tropical sunshine not expected till late August. As a result, we may not start as soon as we would want because we need sunlight to allow demonstrations of how solar cooking works.
In spite of this, all arrangements are in top gear and we hope to start as soon as the weather allows. More updates from the demonstrations will be posted in September. Do come back and check them out.
We would like to thank all our donors for having responded to the plight of rural women in their search for a sustainable source of energy. Thank you very much. We still need more funds to enable us to conduct the full training which will give Mitaboni women skills on how to make solar cookits. The trainings will also be an avenue of making a training video that will be used to train other similar groups.
Empowering these women with new skills will not only help them to prepare meals for their families, but will also help free up time spent looking for firewood for other life-improving activities.
But for this to happen, we need your help. So do keep those funds coming
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