Abuja – The Federal Government on Wednesday approved the contract for the procurement of 750,000 units of clean cooking stove worth N9.2 billion and 18,000 wonderbags for distribution to rural women nationwide free.
The purchase and distribution of the items for free is in furtherance of the National Clean Cooking Scheme.
The Supervising Minister of Information, Dr Nurudeen Muhammed, stated this in Abuja, when he briefed State House correspondents on the outcome of the weekly Federal Executive Council meeting, which was presided over by President Goodluck Jonathan.
He said the scheme was expected to provide 20 million stoves over a five-year period at the rate of four million stoves annually for onward distribution.
“The second memo was presented for council’s ratification of Mr. President’s anticipatory approval for the award of contract for the procurement of 750,000 units of clean cook stove and 18,000 wonder bags for the National Clean Cooking Scheme (NCCS).
“The scheme is an aggressive drive to engender clean cooking culture amongst the poor rural women to reduce and possibly eliminate cooking with solid fossil, which is detrimental to health.
“The scheme is expected to provide 20 million clean stoves over a five-year period at the rate of four million stoves per annum which will be distributed free in all the 774 Local Governments in the country.“
Wonderbag is an eco-friendly non-electric Portable Slow Cooker, which has neither plugs nor fuss.
The minister said the scheme would reduce incessant felling of trees, which exposed the country to ecological problems, when fully operational.
According to him, the carbon credit arising from the registration by the United Nations Framework for Convention on Climatic Change (UNFCCC) will be of immense benefit to Nigeria.
He said the country stood to gain 50 per cent subsidy of the price through the carbon credits that would be generated.
“Council noted that these stoves will be locally assembled and provide jobs to Nigerians among other benefits and unanimously ratified Mr President’s anticipatory approval for the contract.“
The Minister of Environment, Mrs Lawrencia Malam, said the stoves and the wonderbags would be distributed to women nationwide with priority given to those that had purchased fertiliser through the e-wallet system of the agric sector.
“We will first of all consider the women that have bought fertilizer using the e-walllet system.
“The Minister of Agriculture (Dr Akinwumi Adesina) has said that there are at least two million people have done that and then we have an NGO that has registered two million women also they have cut across 774 local governments.
“So, we are going to look at that and distribute irrespective political affiliation, or tribe, religion and so on and so forth, but we want to reach the poor woman in the rural area.“
She expressed the hope that the scheme would boost the health status of the prospective users, saying the stoves and wonderbags would be delivered within 12 weeks. (NAN)
