Alliance Formalizes New Partnership for Cookstoves Pilot Programs in China
This month the Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves expanded its partnership with the All-China Women’s Federation (ACWF) at a special U. S. State Department ceremony in Washington, D.C. This partnership was featured as one of three key deliverables during the Women’s Pillar of the US-China Consultation on People-to-People Exchange, held on June 23-24. Led by China’s Prime Minister Liu Yandong, a Letter of Intent was signed by Alliance CEO, Radha Muthiah, and Mu Hong, Director-General of ACWF, with U.S. Ambassador-at-Large for Global Women's Issues, Cathy Russell, and ACWF Vice-President Meng Xiaosi as witnesses.
In 2014, ACWF hosted an Alliance delegation visit to Xi’an, one of the pilot locations for clean cookstove adoption, to understand the local context and discuss gender strategy with stakeholders. ACWF attended the 2014 Cookstoves Future Summit last year and made a strong commitment to reach out to 600,000 women and girls to raise awareness about clean cooking through training and education campaigns. The Alliance has also invited the ACWF delegation to Kenya to share the lessons from the pilot in Xi’an with partners and stakeholders in Africa.
The Letter of Intent contains three areas for collaboration between the Alliance and ACWF: knowledge sharing, awareness raising, and integrating gender throughout the Chinese national stove pilot programs that the Alliance is helping to put together. After two years of engagement and constructive dialogues, this agreement kicks off a broader collaboration on the Alliance’s gender-informed interventions in China.
