A study by the National Statistical Office (NSO) has revealed that only 1.2 percent of the country’s households use electricity for cooking.
The study, the Fifth Integrated Household survey (IHS5), which was released in Lilongwe on Monday, has exposed the country’s energy poverty and has brought to light the enormous challenge the country’s authorities have to save Malawi’s forests.
The IHS5 has shown that 98.8 percent of the households are using solid fuels as the main fuel used for cooking.The IHS5 says about 79.1 percent of households are using firewood while 18.5 percent use charcoal.
The analysis by level of education shows that 88.6 percent of households with household heads having no education were using firewood compared to 16.5 percent of the heads with tertiary education.
Looking at an analysis by district, Mulanje registered the highest proportion, about 96.1 percent, of households which used firewood for cooking followed by Mzimba and Mchinji both at 95.1 percent.
When it comes to lighting by households, the IHS5 says a higher proportion of about 79.7 percent of households was using dry cell battery or torches for lighting followed by 11.2 percent that were using electricity and 3.9 percent candles.
By place of residence, about 87.9 percent of households in rural areas use torches for lighting compared to 37.6 percent of households in the urban areas.On the other hand about 446 percent of the households in urban areas were using electricity for lighting compared to 4.5 percent of households in the rural areas.
Forestry and Natural Resources Minister Nancy Tembo appealed to community leaders to develop a culture of planting treees for various occasions suvh as birthdays, weddings and other anniversaries.
NSO Commissioner Mercy Kanyuka, said the IHS5 was conducted between April 2019 and March 2020. Specifically the survey collected information on expenditure consumption demographic characteristics, health, education, labour force participation, credit and loan, household enterprises, agriculture, housing structure and asset ownership, food security and mortality indicators,” Kanyuka says.
Source: THE DAILY TIMES_Thursday,December 3 2020_by Taonga Sabora