Dear David
The current cost of a cheap charcoal stove in Lusaka is $1.50 and the most money people can save for a new stove is about $2.50. After accumulating that much, it starts leaking out of the pocket. It is good to see some realistic numbers on what people really can afford to pay for a product. Stove programmes with subsidies are expensive to monitor if abuse is to be avoided and in some countries, nearly impossible to guarantee. For this reason the funding of development and creating capacity is seen as a better mechanism than subsidising products. Paying for marketing to launch is a good way to 'invest' in a new stove that is cheap. There was a publicity campaign mounted in Ulaanbaatar to teach people how to light, run and particularly, to refuel the stove being rolled out by MCA/MCC which is a TLUD coal stove. It costs $1m just for that publicity and it was very effective at changing traditional behaviour. It was money well spent as the stove, correctly operated, can reduce PM emissions more than 98%. Regards Crispin
_______________________________________________ Stoves mailing list to Send a Message to the list, use the email address [email protected] to UNSUBSCRIBE or Change your List Settings use the web page http://lists.bioenergylists.org/mailman/listinfo/stoves_lists.bioenergylists.org for more Biomass Cooking Stoves, News and Information see our web site: http://www.bioenergylists.org/
