By Deborah Asantewaah SARFO
Data from the Ghana Demographic and Health Surveys has shown that the use of clean fuels for cooking by households in the poorest wealth marginally changed from 0 to 0.5 percent over a 19-year period, according to the Ghana Statistical Services (GSS).
While the percentage in these households records a slight increase, the percentage of the country’s population using clean fuels for cooking has about tripled over the past two decades – from 7.3 percent in 2003 to 22.5 percent in 2022.
Clean fuels and technologies for cooking include stoves and cookers using electricity, LPG, natural gas, biogas, solar, alcohol or ethanol.
The report was captured in a press statement issued to commemorate the International Day of Clean Energy, celebrated annually on January 26 to raise awareness of the benefits of clean energy.
The data further reveals substantial variation across groups such that while households in the poorest wealth record marginal change, households in the highest wealth increased from 34.7 to 8 percent over the period and those in the fourth quintile from 1.8 to 27.9 percent.
Similar differences were also recorded across the type of locality, indicating that the usage of clean fuels by households in urban areas doubled from 15.8 to 36.4 percent between 2003 and 2022; while in rural areas, it increased by 5.9 percentage points from 1.2 to 7.1 percent.
With respect to regions of residence, there was also variation in the change over time ranging from 0.9 percentage points increase in the Savannah Region to 24.8 percentage points in the Greater Accra Region.
In all, six regions recorded increases of less than 5 percentage points, which is about a third of the national increase of 15.2 percentage points.
In addition to the Savannah Region, the other regions are North East (1.5 percentage points); Western North (2.4 percentage points) Oti (3.2 percentage points), Upper West (3.2 percentage points) and Bono East (4.5 percentage points).
