Only 40pc Pakistanis have access to clean cooking energy

ISLAMABAD     –     The World Bank Energy Specialist Sadia Qayyum has said that only 40% Pakistanis have access to clean cooking energy and the disparity worsens based on income levels and rural to urban divide.

The energy policies in Pakistan have been traditionally blind to the differences in gender- wise energy consumption and the different impacts they have on genders, she said while speaking at SDPI’s Monday seminar on ‘Women in Energy: Perspective on Clean Energy Transition.’

The World Bank Energy Specialist highlighted the high energy access disparity across the country and said that women in rural areas and lower income households are more vulnerable to lack access to clean energy particularly in cooking.

Afia Malik, Senior Research Economist PIDE, called for longterm integrated institutional and political measures to create strong foundation of sustainable economic empowerment of women especially in rural areas. She said that this is crucial to enable them to adopt clean energy solutions and play effective part in climate change mitigation. She further said that large segment of rural women do not have CNICs which hinders their access to financial services for clean energy solutions and from access to digital services including risk sharing facilities, credit lines and insurances.

Annam Lodhi, Research and Media Coordinator, Renewable First stressed on the role of social media in leveraging awareness on the women, climate and energy nexus. She further suggested that a robust engagement with media can play a pivotal role in increasing awareness and raising the issue of gender disparity in energy access and participation of female labour in energy sector.

Nameerah Hameed, Founder, Women in Energy, said that energy sector globally is male dominated and women account for only 4.6% of technical staff in energy sector and 3.6% in administrative positions. She stressed on increasing participation of women in climate and development solutions, increase their engagement in climate actions, in public leadership roles leading climate responses. She further said that women representation in the country delegations must be increased to at least to 50% at COP to mainstream gender equality in leadership positions.

Fiza Qureshi, Programme Manager, Indus Consortium Member, PREC, said that Pakistan is the second worst performing country in terms of gender parity which is also evident in energy access. She said that rural women spend most of their time at home shouldering the entire burden of household chores making them highly vulnerable to energy poverty. She stressed that the transition to clean energy in Pakistan must include solar power cooking appliances for feminist just energy transition in Pakistan. She suggested that the international financial institutions should consider debt to climate swaps and reallocate them to increase access of rural flood affected women to energy, education and livelihoods.

Dr Abid Qaiyum Suleri, Executive Director, SDPI, said that research shows that women in rural areas are not only burdened with collection of bio-mass for energy but also suffer the health burden of respiratory diseases from the exposure to hazardous smoke.

He further said that gender segregated data is a key element in gender affirmative responses and ensuring gender mainstreaming in climate policies as well as to make substantial progress towards the SDG5 that calls for gender equality.

Article source: https://www.nation.com.pk/28-Mar-2023/only-40pc-pakistanis-have-access-to-clean-cooking-energy