Several women in rural parts of Gujarat have adopted a new way of cooking by making use of solar cookers priced between Rs 50 to Rs 100, which is much lesser than the conventional prices amounting to thousands of rupees, reported The Better India.
The solar cooker campaign of Alzubair Saiyed, the senior manager at the Gujarat Grassroots Innovation Augmentation Network, has helped women living in rural areas of Gujarat overcome the dependence on fuels generated from wood or cow dung for cooking.
According to The Better India, Alzubair said, “Half of the world’s population is still dependent on fuels generated from wood or cow dung for cooking, and every year, 160 lakh hectares of forests are destroyed to obtain wood. This not only harms the environment but is also a root cause for various severe health issues for those continuously exposed to its fumes. In this case, it is the women.”
Alzubair, a former assistant professor in an engineering institute, left his job to give more time to this project.
Alzubair and his former student, Virendra Dhakhda started the solar cooking campaign in October with the help of Sharon Clausson’s Copenhagen Solar Cooker, under which they trained women, men and students from rural and tribal areas to make their own solar cookers.
“We began the campaign on 18 October 2016 with the help of the Copenhagen Solar Cooker. I interacted with Sharon and with her encouragement, I made a simpler version of the same and began to teach others to do the same through workshops in various parts of the state,” he said.
Till now, they have covered more than 100 villages in Gujarat, including Panchmahal, Narmada, Jamnagar, and Jetpur.
(With inputs from The Better India)
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