[Stoves] News: India's new LPG customers seem to not use as much LPG

[Nikhil Desai]

Two recent stories below.

I am not surprised. Lower-income people with access to woodfuel may have
economic reasons to not switch to LPG completely. (At Rs 65/US$, monthly
expenditures by the bottom 20% of households is about $100. A subsidized
gas cylinder at Rs 450 = $6.60.) The terms of loan for initial cylinder and
stove are also a deterrent.

Maybe Johnson-Chiang can help generate new numbers for premature mortality
in India from Household Air Pollution. If a complete or near-complete
switch to clean cooking solutions at Tier 4 is required, Modi's subsidy
scheme may be a biggest boondoggle ever.

Alternatively, it is entirely possible that the poor just do not consume as
much cooking fuel as the middle class, in urban or rural areas.

My observations in Gujarat, Maharashtra were that making and serving tea
inside homes was a middle-class phenomenon. Who else has the time to start
up a stove six times a day to serve family members and guests? Who has
guests any more on regular work days? The working poor just don't have
enough variety to cook -- I am not talking about destitutes or calorie
deficit - that requires more fuel.

This is a common phenomenon - lower incomes mean lower useful energy
required in cooking, and even more of "outsourcing the kitchen".

It's not as if WHO "database" was based on actual measurements year after
year.

Kirk Smith's challenge to biomass stove community just got a little more
urgent. (Separately).


Nikhil


India’s poor are not using LPG cylinders they got under Ujjwala scheme
<http://www.livemint.com/Politics/oqLQDFKNuMdbmLEVL88krN/Indias-poor-are-not-using-LPG-cylinders-they-got-under-Ujjw.html>
, Roshan Kishore, Mint 27 June 2017

"Year-on-year (y-o-y) growth in LPG consumption increased from 9% in
2015-16 to 9.8% in 2016-17. Contrast this with y-o-y growth in LPG
customers, which increased from 10.2% in 2015-16 to 16.2% in 2016-17.

There is nothing surprising about this. PMUY beneficiaries do not have to
pay security deposit or other overhead costs while taking LPG connections.
They also have the option of paying for gas stove and first refill at the
time of getting connection in instalments. However, there is no extra
concession from the second refill stage.

Even a subsidised cylinder costs around Rs450. Paying for one LPG cylinder
per month is not an insignificant expenditure for poor households in India.
A Plainfacts column had reported that the bottom 20% of India’s households
spent less than Rs7,000 per month in 2016. Kerosene, which is around Rs20
per litre, or firewood is a much cheaper cooking fuel.

Modi’s pet Ujjawala scheme wobbles as many beneficiaries drop out after
their first LPG cylinder
<https://scroll.in/article/839961/modis-pet-ujjawala-scheme-wobbles-as-many-beneficiaries-drop-out-after-their-first-lpg-cylinder>,
Dhirendra K. Jha, Scroll.in 11 June 2017

"Since the great majority of below poverty line households have taken
Ujjawala connections using the loan on offer, they have to pay for refills
at the market rate – they cannot avail of the LPG subsidy (which the oil
firms now pocket) until they have paid the loan back via the subsidies.
Since the subsidy per cylinder amounts to around one-fourth of its cost,
Ujjawala beneficiaries must refill their cylinders around seven to eight
times at the market rate for the subsidy to accumulate to be enough to
write off the loan."


On 1 May 2016, Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the Pradhan Mantri
Ujjwala Yojna (PMUY). The scheme intends to provide 50 million LPG
connections to women from Below Poverty Line (BPL) families. It has been a
roaring success so far. 20 million LPG connections
<http://www.livemint.com/Industry/KQwnD5F0gTY3gqyxylH5QJ/Ujjwala-scheme-exceeds-target-covers-over-2-crore-household.html>
have
been issued in 2016-17 against a target of 15 million. These numbers
suggest a revolution in cooking methods for the poor.




A state-wise comparison lends support to this logic. Relatively poorer
states such as Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Madhya Pradesh are the ones with
the highest mismatch between sales and customer growth between 2015-16 and
2016-17.

Given the high growth in the number of LPG subscribers, the government is
right in celebrating the success of PMUY. However, it should make a fresh
assessment whether these numbers have taken us closer towards more
widespread use of a clean cooking fuel.
First Published: Tue, Jun 27 2017. 09 04 AM IST
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