Over 4 million people per year die prematurely per year from illnesses attributable to the burning of solid fuels in poorly ventilated homes. Most victims are from rural, low-income homes and still rely on wood, crop wastes, charcoal, coal and dung for heat and cooking. An organisation called Dazin aims to solve this problem by providing needy households with a combination of fuel cookies and smokeless stoves.
The Bhutan-based group provides the combination to rural households in exchange of forestry wood waste. This collected wood waste is densified into fuel cookies in a local factory.
“The efficiency of our combined solution allows us to produce fuel cookies in excess compared to the wood waste collected. These surplus fuel cookies are sold in cities to offset the free services provided in rural areas,” said the organisation.
“Dazin follows an inclusive circular economy model to provide clean, reliable and renewable fuel in Bhutan while reducing greenhouse gases and generating jobs.”
Dazin’s fuel cookies are locally made from sustainably available forestry wood waste densification. It uses 84 per cent less wood compared to open fire cooking.
It comes with an efficient gasifying stove which makes it safer for people to cook and also helps the environment by eliminating black carbon emissions.
Dazin's crowdfunding campaign aims to raise $40 000 by 6 September 2015 in an effort to provide fuel cookies and stoves to 2000 more people in Bhutan.
