Cooking fuels and sustainable social development: the case of Africa

Access to energy is vital in addressing many of the current global sustainable development adversities that continue to impact on people’s economic, social and physical well-being. Despite the expanding attention from national and international governments, agencies and academics, energy poverty remains a reality for millions of people living in Africa. As a whole, the African energy sector is described to be the most impoverished part of the global energy system. The aim of this paper is to review the challenges and opportunities of the African energy system: focusing on the most demanded, yet, most overlooked energy service - cooking. In addition, it presents empirical results illustrating the effects of the inaccessibility to modern cooking fuels on aspects of sustainable social development: using the panel data of the African region.