Latin American Partners Gather in Peru for Regional Workshop
The broader Latin American region recently held the Latin American Workshop on Clean Cooking (Primer Seminario Taller Latinoamericano de Cocinas Limpias) in Lima, Peru from June 16-18.
Participants attended from across the region including Peru, Bolivia, Ecuador, Colombia, Chile, Brazil, Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, and the Dominican Republic, as well as Germany, the UK, the US and Switzerland. This three-day event was sponsored by the Alliance with funding from the Government of Finland and organized by a committee representing four countries from the region. The workshop was an opportunity for the Latin American clean cooking sector to draw from extensive knowledge within the region, showcase country experiences in Central and South America, and highlight achievements in research, adoption, technology development, and more. This gathering also enabled participants to broaden their networks, exchange experiences, and build momentum for increased regional cooperation and partnership.
Vice Minister of Energy and Mines Edwin Quintanilla of Peru opened the workshop and shared the successes and challenges of the government’s national cookstove and clean energy programs. With an ambitious target of disseminating 1 million liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) cookstoves by 2020, the government has already installed over 300,000 stoves.
Opening plenaries included presentations by Dr. Sumi Mehta of the Alliance, who discussed the global state of the clean cooking sector and the Alliance’s Phase II Roadmap for scaling clean cooking solutions over the course of the next three years, and Dr. Omar Masera of the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM) and the workshop organizing committee, who focused his remarks on cookstoves and fuels in the Latin American region, emphasizing both achievements and persistent challenges.
Topics of discussion during the conference ranged from standards and testing, health, social, and environmental impacts and carbon finance, past experiences and new approaches to use and adoption of cookstoves, financing and capacity building for enterprises – including Alliance funds and resources, among other topics. An additional day of short courses and trainings allowed participants to delve deeper into tools for quality assurance in cookstoves testing, monitoring stove use and adoption in real time, accessing carbon markets through Gold Standard certification, or visiting the cookstove testing laboratory at SENCICO. The Alliance organized a full day training course conducted by local Peruvian and Bolivian partners to inform partners of opportunities to scale their operations through examining new business models and developing capacity in key areas including women’s empowerment.
Workshop participants drafted a resolution affirming their commitment to addressing this issue across Latin America and described the progress made during the workshop. The organizing committee will circulate the declaración conjunta to participants and interested individuals for comments and revision.
This event successfully mobilized partners around our shared goal of removing the barriers that prevent the adoption of clean cookstoves and fuels at scale in Latin America, and the organizers look forward to continuing to convene this gathering biennially.