[Stoves] News CCF2017: Indian business leader calls for subsidies to cookstove manufacturers

[Nikhil Desai]

Murthy pitches for subsidies to clean energy firms
<http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow/61199603.cms>, Economic
Times 25 October 2017

Says "the government should provide subsidies to businesses which sell
clean energy products like cookstoves in rural India."

I don't think he means LPG and electric cookstoves. Paul's Declaration is
timely.

>From about a half of Indian states whose rural areas I have traveled in
over the years, the so-called "three-stone fire" or "rudimentary stoves"
that are taken to be the baseline by academics constitute at most a half of
the total biomass cooking market in households. Kitchens and in-place
stoves, with chimneys and windows for ventilation, have existed for over a
century (going by popular memories and records of built homes). The
artisanal and manufacturing capacity at sizable scales using a variety of
materials and for a variety of fuel types and qualities exists.

The bureaucratic aspects of organizing subsidy distribution also exists,
though not greatly admirable across states.

It is silly to obsess over "truly health protective" gibberish and ISO DIS.
The real challenge is in distribution and competitive innovation. Minimum
standards of some type are necessary, but the market is not ready for a
"per stove" subsidy and the gimmicks like Gold Standard should be dumped
aside.

In short, organizing a subsidy scheme for better biomass stoves, for modern
cooking, will be difficult. India has tried and failed before; the experts'
dreams have gone Up in Smoke. But old experts' failures need not doom the
poor.

Nikhil
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.bioenergylists.org/pipermail/stoves_lists.bioenergylists.org/attachments/20171025/13f4d4ff/attachment.html>