Solar cooker saves forests

Twenty-year-old Lucy Mazengera, 20, from Mazengera Village in Salima District did not fancy studying solar technology. However, she was compelled by massive youth unemployment, low rural electrification and rapid loss of forests in Malawi. Mazengera studied solar energy technology at Kindle Orphan Outreach Vocational and Training Centre in the district along Lake Malawi.

Among others, she has acquired skills to fashion an insulated solar electric cooker using concrete mix molded in a plastic bucket. The cooker is a brainchild of Professor Peter Stewart from Caroline University in California, US, who visited the shoreline district as a researcher. A portable solar panel transforms sunlight into electricity for powering the cookstove.

“Cooking should be simple and clean for all,” Mazengera says. “I want to transform my village using solar power for clean cooking, lighting and business use.” However, forests across the country go up in smoke as nearly every household—about 98 percent—cook using firewood and charcoal. The smoky, three-stone, open fires do not only deplete trees but emit smoky fumes that exposes people, especially women and children, to deadly diseases.

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According to the World Health Organisation, indoor air pollution fuelled by fumes from firewood, charcoal, coal and crop residues cause about 3.8 million premature deaths annually. The Energy Department estimates that about a quarter of Malawi’s population is connected to the national grid, but 95 percent of the rural majority remain excluded over 40 years since Electricity Supply Corporation of Malawi (Escom)rolled out the Malawi Rural Electrification Programme, now under the Ministry of Energy and Mining. As the long wait for grid power persists, Mazengera says solar power and other renewable offer reliable energy solutions for cooking, lighting and business chores while protecting the environment and human health. Her course is certified by the Technical, Entrepreneurial and Vocational Education and Training (Tevet) Authority.

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