- This tour aligns with the Ministry’s target to attain the distribution of 500,000 efficient biomass cookstoves to over 350,000 households in the country between 2019 and 2024.
- A Rekoff Co Ltd senior official, Mr Francis Kugblenu, conducted the team around the premises to observe and explain the manufacturing process.
Officials of the Ministry of Energy led some media personnel on a tour of the Rekoff Company at Joma Ablekuma in the Ga West District of the Greater Accra Region to create public awareness of the benefits of clean cooking. This tour aligns with the Ministry’s target to attain the distribution of 500,000 efficient biomass cookstoves to over 350,000 households in the country between 2019 and 2024, primarily targeting low-income families in urban and peri-urban communities nationwide.
According to Ing Seth Mahu, Director of the Renewable Energy Directorate of the Ministry, the Improved Cookstoves Distribution Project is a US$ 5 million collaboration between the Ministry of Energy and the Climate Change Centre (CCC) of South Korea. A Rekoff Co Ltd senior official, Mr Francis Kugblenu, conducted the team around the premises to observe and explain the manufacturing process. According to him, the company produces about 500 units of cookstoves per day, with a workforce of 100, the majority of whom are women.
He further stated that the company’s activities have helped create several jobs in the catchment area, thereby boosting the local economy. The project has so far completed distribution in the Greater Accra, Ashanti, Central Regions covering Ninety-four (94) districts, Nine Hundred and Seventy-Seven (977) communities with an allocation of Three hundred and sixteen thousand, six hundred and seven (316,607) stoves. Further, about fifty-seven thousand one hundred and seventy (57,170) stoves have been distributed in the Western, Northern, Upper East, and Volta regions, according to Ing. Mahu.
The team further visited households in the vicinity, where some people, particularly women, have been beneficiaries of the improved cookstoves, to ascertain their benefits. The unanimous view among those interviewed was that these cookstoves had brought them enormous benefits as they no longer have to deal with harmful smoke emissions and that financially, the cookstoves had enabled them to save a considerable amount of money as they now use far less charcoal for the same amount of fuel.