Prolonged exposure to smoke from cooking with open fires leads to around 2 million deaths a year worldwide. Shell is providing $6 million to the Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves, a public-private partnership led by the United Nations Foundation, to help achieve the goal of providing clean cookstoves to 100 million homes by 2020. These stoves burn fuel more efficiently, reducing cooking time and lowering harmful emissions.
Shell is providing business expertise, including a secondee, to help develop global standards and make sure that customers can obtain good-quality cookstoves, approved and tested in each local market. We work to encourage more involvement in the campaign from corporate and public organisations, and raise awareness of the risks of using inefficient cookstoves. Our support builds on the work of Shell Foundation, which has been working to build an international market for affordable clean cookstoves since 2002. This work has benefited 4 million people and created a global business with long-term partner Envirofit International to supply efficient biomass-burning stoves to homes across Asia, Africa and Latin America.