TITLE:
Increasing Access to Clean Cooking: The Practicality of Pay-Go in Promoting Adoption of Bottled Gas in Kinondoni, Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania
AUTHORS:
Editha M. Ndunguru
KEYWORDS:
Clean Cooking, Practicality, Adoption, Pay-Go, Bottled Gas
JOURNAL NAME:
International Journal of Clean Coal and Energy,
Vol.10 No.3,
August
30,
2021
ABSTRACT: The majority of the population in
developing countries have limited access to clean energy. To
increase access to clean energy, the governments and other stakeholders have
been working hard to create enabling environments for their adoption and utilization.
For the household cooking sector, technological innovations such as improved
biomass fuels, improved biomass cookstove, solar cooking, biogas and recently
bottled gas service have been or are being deployed to scale up clean cooking. Nevertheless, a good number of the innovations
intended for upscaling clean cooking in developing countries have failed
to meet the desired goals due to limited support from the national governments
or the international community. Pay-Go is among the recent innovations in the
East African region intended for promoting the use of bottled gas (liquefied petroleum gas-LPG). This study
evaluates the practicality of Pay-Go
innovation on bottled gas, popularly known as Pay-as-you-Cook. Specifically, the article examines the evolution of Pay-as-you-Cook, its
execution, usefulness and challenges; and
its implications on household energy sector development. The study was
conducted in Kinondoni Municipality, Dar es Salaam, Tanzania between 2018 and
2020. The study used both qualitative and
quantitative approaches. Purposive and non-random sampling techniques
were used in selecting respondents. Purposive sampling was used to identify key
informants while snowball sampling was used to find household respondents. Information was gathered from
KopaGas (Pay-as-you-Cook innovator) headquarter-Kinondoni Morocco; and
from Pay-as-you-Cook clients in Kinondoni Moscow, Mkwajuni and Hananasif.
Methods of data collection involved semi-structured interviews and observation.
Instruments of data collection included interview guides and observation
checklists. Data analysis was accomplished
with Nvivo 12. Findings show that Pay-as-you-Cook innovation was
intended for promoting bottled gas adoption mainly to low-income households.
The innovation was discovered to be convenient to many low- income households as it enabled them to use bottled gas for cooking
without necessarily climbing the economic ladder. Yet, the innovation presents
several challenges which are doubtful to its practicality.