RESPECT International Blog

by Seigo Robinson
The Problem: Cost-effective and reliable fuel sources

War-affected communities in the West Africa region are often faced with the problem of not being able to find a cheap and reliable fuel source for heating and cooking. Many households spend some 25 per cent or more of their income on cooking fuel.

Alternatively, people can spend many hours getting to and chopping down firewood which damages the environment. A potential solution that is attracting increasing attention is the concept of the solar cooker.
The Solution: Solar cooker

There are a multitude of benefits that the solar cooker concept can bring:

* Safety
o Fire-free cooking is vastly safer (especially for children)
o Lack of smoke is much better for health, reducing irritation to eyes and lungs
* Health
o Sanitized dishes and utensils
o Moderate temperatures preserve nutrients in food
o Nutrient-high legumes can be cooked that would not have been affordable previously owing to the amount of fuel required for the long cooking times needed for legumes
* Economics
o Saves money on cooking fuels
* Convenience
o Moderate temperatures mean no stirring is required as food will not burn
o Removal for need to collect firewood (solar cookers can remove up to 90 per cent of firewood collection time)
o Pots and pans are easy to clean and reduces the time and requirement for collecting more water for washing

Initiative: Identification and dissemination of affordable solar cooker concept

One issue with current solar cookers is that they can cost up to $200 USD (about €149 EUR) and are not an affordable option for war-affected communities.

Therefore, to assist war-affected communities to establish solar ovens in their own community, RESPECT International has set itself a mission to:

* Research what designs have the potential to produce affordable solar cookers
* Determine what cookers would be most appropriate for what purpose with consideration of costs/skills/materials required to construct them in situ via an on-the-ground survey
* Produce an instruction manual on how to build and use the decided upon designs and spread this information among the war-affected communities

The team has already completed Phase 1: researching different solar cooker designs and getting a survey answered from a contact in Liberia to provide input about the type of materials available, the type of food being cooked, and the cooking habits of the people.

Over the coming months, the team will continue to pursue this mission to successfully deliver a tailored handbook that can help the lives of refugees in West Africa.
The team

The team includes:

* Marc Schaeffer, RESPECT International, Coordinator
* Shetha Koon Myers, the Liberian contact
* Gao Xiang Chen, who is pursuing a neuroscience major at the University of Rochester
* Seigo Robinson, a management consultant with a Master’s Degree in Chemical Engineering from Cambridge University
* Rameez Riaz, who is studying chemical and bioengineering at McMaster University
* Natelie Byczynski, an environmental engineer with an MBA and project management diploma