In this small rural Zambian village situated within the Simalaha Community Conservancy, the Peace Parks team, Lise-Marie Greeff-Villet and Lésa van Rooyen are incredibly excited to come across some women using cookstoves, a fuel-efficient and sustainable alternative to the traditional open fire method of cooking. The traditional method of cooking throughout Zambia and many other parts of Africa requires the need for illegal logging and at times charcoal burning practices, an act that poses a major threat to the environment and the health of the communities.
As Peace Parks and its partners are committed to ensuring the well-being of the communities within the Simalaha conservancy, they have been hard at work creating a rather clever alternative solution.
And so these nifty little cookstoves were born!
The cookstoves are extremely fuel-efficient and mitigate the need to cut down big trees for cooking to take place. Instead, it only requires small branches and twigs to generate the same amount of heat as the traditional open-fire cooking method. Due to its shape and design, the heat is funnelled upwards towards the cooking top instead of dispersing outwards, making for a much faster and easier process.
With many of Zambia’s rural communities not having access to electricity, they are forced to rather depend on wood-burning for means of cooking. This process poses major health risks due to the inhalation of high levels of carbon monoxide, carbon dioxide and soot. Apart from health complications, this traditional method also involves the need to cut down large and often already established trees, many of which are indigenous to the area. This is a large contributor to the severe destruction of Zambia’s forests and remains a major concern to the wildlife as they often rely on these trees for food, shelter, nesting and reproduction sites.
For many families living in these rural communities, burning these large trees and logs is their only means of cooking food. These fantastic little cookstoves were thus created to help support and assist communities as well as look after the environment that they live in.
With nearly 10 000 cookstoves already being distributed to households within Simalaha, Peace Parks and its partners are committed to continue assisting communities with more of these sustainable cooking alternatives.
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