CFSP aims at livelihood improvement and sustainable development in Cambodia with the dissemination of appropriate technologies. Our approach is to mainstream ecological, low-tech, economically sound and user friendly solutions through the local private sector. For instance, we train traditional stove makers to switch to improved cookstove production; facilitate negotiations along the supply chain, and advertise the new product to Cambodian housewives. Other technologies involve: owner-built stoves, institutional stoves, biogas digesters, solar dryers, sustainable charcoal production, post combustion stoves for micro-enterprises, and biofuel.
Contact Information
CFSP is working at the national scale. For commercialized improved stoves, the system in place now disseminates over 60,000 cookstoves per month, and this number if increasing (the target population is 2.4 million households). These provide benefits to 300,000 additional people every year (urban or peri-urban), by saving fuel, money, and reducing the smoke, soot and exposure to indoor air pollution. Owner built stoves are disseminated through community level organizations, mainstreamed into gender, agriculture, environment, or socio-economic programs. The target population is rural, at national scale (see www.wenetcam.net). CFSP is a member of the ARECOP network. We receive trainees from other Asian countries that come to learn about the technologies and methodologies of intervention.
Our Experience And Interest In The Four PCIA Central Focus Areas
The availability of fuel is a concern in many areas. Reverting to inferior fuels (cow dung, agrowaste) poses a series of problems. Besides improved stoves, we also work on energy gardening and community forestry. In this way, traditional fuel supply becomes sustainable either for family use in the countryside, or for export to urban users.
After considerable trial and errors, and lessons learnt, the approach chosen was to work with skilled traditional artisans, who volunteered to get trained on improved stove construction. The improved stoves can be disseminated through the existing marketing channels of traditional stoves. The success of this approach is monitored by the conversion ratios (stove makers gradually stop traditional stove production, and concentrate on improved stoves), and the emergence of copycats.
Standardization is a real issue in Asia, where low-education of producers levels and copycats tend to bring down the quality expectation of any new commercial success. So far the project has managed to keep the quality of improved stoves to standard, and rope in copycat producers, providing them with skills and business support, so that their production reaches an acceptable quality. For the rural stoves, many models were tested, but finally only two designs were selected: Baby Samakki and Ba Phnom stoves.
Indoor air pollution is not an issue in rural areas: kitchens, most often, have no solid walls. It could very well be in urban areas (that use mostly charcoal). But we need capacity building from PCIA to be able to assess this.
Relevant Publications or Studies
None noted
Our Contribution to the Partnership
CFSP can contribute in terms of commercialization experience. Methodologies and strategies of intervention will be documented, especially with regard to monitoring. We have developed field test methodhologies, that provide very clear data on fuel saving and cooking practices, in addition to the common laboratory tests.
