More than 2 billion people lack access to clean cooking facilities, relying on the traditional use of solid biomass, kerosene, or coal as their primary cooking fuel. Household air pollution, mostly from cooking smoke, is linked to around 3.7 million premature deaths a year. Historically, progress has been very limited compared to electricity access.

The energy crisis and the related inflationary environment in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic have slowed progress and exposed consumers to the dual threat of reduced income and higher prices of clean cooking fuel, pushing millions that recently had gained access, at least temporarily, to switch back to traditional and harmful cooking solutions.

In 2024, after releasing the report “A Vision for Clean cooking Access for All” which provided the latest data and trends on clean cooking as well as a feasible pathway to achieving universal access by 2030, the IEA hosted the first international Summit on Clean Cooking in Africa, bringing together diverse stakeholders and eliciting an important commitment of USD 2.2 billion to tackle the clean cooking gap in Africa.

Developing Asia is home to 50% of the global population without access, with around 1.1 billion people lacking clean cooking solutions. This figure is ten times more than the number of people who lack access to electricity in the region. Progress has primarily been driven by programmes in some countries that incentivised the use of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) and clean air policies. Access rates in 2022 reached 70% in India and 90% in China and Indonesia.

In sub-Saharan Africa, which represents around half of the access gap, 29 countries have access rates below 20%, and the region has seen a continued increase in the number of people without access to clean cooking since tracking started, reaching around 960 million in 2023.

The reliance on gathering or purchasing wood, charcoal and other biomass for cooking dramatically damages health and impairs productivity, with women and children disproportionately impacted. The inefficient combustion of fuelwood and charcoal leads to high releases of methane and other GHGs, and unsustainable harvesting contributes to deforestation. Achieving universal clean cooking access can save up to 1.5 Gt CO₂eq by 2030, 900 Mt of which in sub-Saharan Africa alone.

Around 1.7 billion people remain without access to clean cooking in 2030 in the STEPS, far from reaching the universal access target in SDG 7.1.2.

In developing Asia, the projected access rate in 2030 is 82%, leaving around 760 million people without access. Significant progress is projected for India, where the number of people without access is expected to reduce from 430 million in 2023 to 285 million in 2030. This indicates an increase in access rate from the current rate of approximately 70% to 81%. China, today home to 146 million people without access, is expected to achieve universal access to clean cooking by 2028.

In sub-Saharan Africa, the number of people gaining access to clean cooking barely exceeds population growth as switching from the traditional use of biomass to cleaner options faces both economic, logistic and cultural barriers. Around 940 million people are expected to still live without access to clean cooking in 2030.

To achieve the objective of the Net Zero Emissions by 2050 Scenario in line with SDG 7, nearly 300 million people need to gain access to clean cooking solutions each year. Significant increase in policies and investments will be required to support this achievement and different clean cooking technologies and fuels needs to be deployed.

In the IEA’s Access for All scenario, showcased in the Clean Cooking report a diverse portfolio of technologies is deployed to reach full access to clean cooking by 2030 while simultaneously reducing greenhouse gas emissions and other climate forcing agents (e.g., black carbon). The share of people gaining access by technology in the Access for All scenario is as follows: 45% with LPG, 32% with improved biomass cook stoves (concentrated in rural areas), 12% with electricity and the remaining 10% with biogas or ethanol. Electric cooking is becoming a more attractive option as the costs of electric appliances decline, and as the current price crisis leads to efforts to reduce dependence on imported fuels. The annual investment needed to achieve full clean cooking access by 2030 is around USD 8 billion. However, current investment is inadequate, averaging just 30% of the required levels and reaching orders of magnitude lower in many countries especially in sub-Saharan Africa.