Abidjan, Jan 22, 2022 (AIP)- The World Health Organization (WHO) announces that the use of inefficient and polluting fuels and technologies for cooking meals negatively affects 2.6 billion people, reports a news report from Russian news agency Sputnik.

In a new report published this week on the use of different types of cooking fuels at the global, regional and national levels, the UN institution regrets that a third of the world’s population, or 2.6 billion people, n still don’t have access to a clean kitchen.

According to estimates in this report, one third of the world’s population will continue to use polluting fuels by 2030 with the majority residing in sub-Saharan Africa.

The WHO also points out that the use of inefficient and polluting fuels and technologies constitutes a health risk and a major cause of illness and death, particularly among women and children in low- and middle-income countries.

“Breathing the smoke produced by cooking with polluting fuels can lead to heart disease, stroke, cancer, chronic lung disease and pneumonia,” the report warned, warning that millions of people continue, sadly, to die prematurely each year due to household air pollution produced by the use of inefficient stoves and appliances associated with wood, coal, charcoal, manure, crop waste and in kerosene.

From 2010 to 2019, the rate of access to clean cooking fuels and technologies only increased by about 1% per year, according to the WHO, which noted that a large part of this increase is mainly due to the improving access to clean cooking in the five most populous low- and middle-income countries (Brazil, China, India, Indonesia and Pakistan).

The report also notes that gaseous cooking fuels dominate in urban areas, biomass fuels are still common in rural populations. Dependence on electricity for cooking is increasing in urban contexts.

Source: Agence Ivoirienne de Presse