[Stoves] Regenerative Capitalism (Jock Gill)

[Dean Still]

Hi Frank,

I think that it's very important to add the distributor to the list when
thinking about creating a new stove. The distributor, from the very start,
helps to define the product and adds a lot of 'reality' to the process. In
India, we met with a group of distributors to learn about what they could
sell and their inputs were extremely important in the development process.
They said that the stove needed to cost less than 5 dollars, that a woman
needed to carry two of them a mile to her home, and that 2,000 needed to
fit on a truck.

I would get the distributor on the team before doing the other work.

Best,

Dean

On Wed, Jun 3, 2015 at 10:21 AM, Frank Shields <franke at cruzio.com> wrote:

> Dear Crispin and Stovers,
>
> Crispin writes:
>
> Which is the most important, the most significant, the most influential
> factor creating the final products? The cook.
>
>
> The process goes like this:
>
> 1) The cook tells the stove designer what they want.
> 2) The designer makes the stove to do what the cook wants.
> 3) The lab helps the designer with gap measurements, suggested materials
> that will work the best etc.
> 4) The lab tests all the stoves for the purpose of determining the ones
> that will work best for the cooks at a site.
> 5) The finished stove that will do what the cook requests will come with
> instructions and, perhaps, a recipe book. Then the individual skills of the
> cooks take over.
>
> The only job of the cook is to tell the designer what they want. Then all
> is left to the designer and the lab (scientist) to make what the cook
> wants. If the cook likes the stove the process went well.  If we bring the
> cook into the picture after they have told the designer what they want then
> we are bringing in another -huge- unnecessary variable we must get control
> of. To get control of it we will need lots of cooks (N values) to use in
> testing each of the stoves being developed.
>
> If the final product fails or is not widely accepted by the cooks then it
> means there was a lack of communication between the cook and the designer.
> Perhaps the cook likes food cooked in a smoky environment. Then the
> designer must design a stove where that will happen in a safe manner. But
> if we bring the cooks back into the testing part of stove development we
> make the process unmanageable and a lot of stove designers will have stoves
> that will not see the light of day.    To be able to keep the cooks out of
> the process after they have told the designer what they want we need do a
> lot of work on Step 4 above. And that process starts with understanding the
> biomass they use as fuel.
>
> Regards
>
> Frank
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Frank Shields
> franke at cruzio.com
>
>
> On May 31, 2015, at 12:07 PM, Crispin Pemberton-Pigott <
> crispinpigott at outlook.com> wrote:
>
> Dear Stovers and Discussants (if you are not stovers)
>
> Samer indirectly asks if this: “…centric approach serves the 'poor' or
> the 'environment'.”
>
> Consider this: steel sheeting is made without no anticipation of the
> products that will be formed from it.
>
> A stove designer forms a product from steel sheets, limited by his or her
> understanding of what might be possible using it.
>
> Nature produces a variety of fuels with different properties and strengths
> with no concern as to what possible fire may consume them.
>
> A cook buys the stove and creates foods unimagined by the stove designer
> or the steel maker. The cook uses the fuels in ways unseen in natural
> fires. The cook makes the fire and the stove sing and dance, performing the
> required actions, producing the right amount of heat, light, and food.
>
> Which is the most important, the most significant, the most influential
> factor creating the final products? The cook. Without understanding the
> needs, desires, intentions and skills of the cooks, how is it possible to
> design a stove or fuel, or combination, that will do what is needed? It is
> not possible.
>
> Homogenizing the production and broadening the footprint of distribution
> of improved stoves carries great risks, mostly the risk of failure to
> adopt. Similarly the introduction of subsidized fuels has multiple intended
> and unintended consequences.
>
> With this in mind we should recognize there are two large scale agendas at
> work.
>
> The first is those who would replace the stoves with products that are far
> more efficient and flexible, attractive to own and worth investing in for
> comfort and pleasure with reduced PM and CO emissions and which make better
> use of the available energy carriers.
>
> The second is that group which seek to remove solid fuels altogether from
> the kitchen, promoting as they do and will, electricity, LPG, natural gas
> and light fraction liquid fuels.  Their byline is 'to provide clean cooking
> solutions to those who have traditionally been forced to burn solid
> fuels'.  The implication is that there are no 'clean-burning' solid fuels
> which rather sets their agenda against that of the first group.
>
> Old-timers may remember the contribution by Liz Bates (former editor of
> Boiling Point magazine) remarking on the improvement in the lives of cooks
> in Sudan who received subsidised LPG stoves and fuel. LPG is a wonderful
> solution to IAQ problems, but does LPG address all the social and material
> needs of the users of fire?
>
> Let's ask Cecil.
>
> Regards
> Crispin
>
> ===============
>
> Dear Jock,
>
> I found the article very stimulating. Of course, there is much that can be
> examined in terms of how the global stoves 'industry' is developing. For
> instance, if one examines the topics discussed at the ETHOS meetings year
> in and out, there are moments when clear shifts in what is being discussed
> (and who discusses) occur. As I read it, the broad trend has shifted from
> concerns of design, implementation, and marketing in context, to global
> markets (e.g. carbon credits, international testing standards, advocacy).
>
> This trajectory will have foreseeable benefits for energy-oriented
> bilateral agreements, mass manufacturers of stoves, NGOs/corporations that
> will tap into carbon offsets, and laboratories authorized to certify
> stoves, etc. Along with this is a strong *claim* that this global
> market-centric approach serves the 'poor' or the 'environment'.
>
> I wish to stay way from simple dichotomous arguments of global/local,
> top-down/bottom-up, standardized/pluralism, or laboratory/field, but
> certainly the 'regenerative capitalism' approach you suggest might demand a
> reconsideration of this trend towards standardization, scale, and
> donor-driven markets? What alternatives might your approach suggest?
>
> Your thoughts on this matter are appreciated!
>
> Best,
> Samer
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