Universal access to clean cooking energy and the need for an inclusive policy: evidence from analysis of cooking fuel use in Odisha and Tamil Nadu

Abstract

This paper briefly maps the existing policies on clean cooking fuel and examines the achievements to increase the coverage of clean energy for cooking in India and emphasizes the need to go beyond the ‘price’ and ‘income’ criteria in targeting universal access to clean fuel for cooking. By undertaking a comparative analysis of cooking fuel use patterns across two states, differentiated in terms of key economic parameters, this paper highlights policies that aimed at clean fuel switching in India need to pay attention to social groups, gender and location (rural/urban) to make clean cooking fuel policies more inclusive in order to realize the target of universal access to clean cooking energy. The analysis was carried out across expenditure categories, social groups and female-headed households. The results show wide disparity in clean cooking fuel use across the states as well as across different expenditure categories, social groups and female-headed households and geographical locations within states. The data source for the analysis is the National Sample Survey Organisation and Census.