Adoption and kitchen performance test of improved cook stove in the Bale Eco-Region of Ethiopia

This study was conducted to assess the determinants of households' decision for adoption of improved cook stoves (ICS), the performance of the stoves under real kitchen conditions and their potential in the reduction of greenhouse gas emission in Bale Eco-region, Southeastern Ethiopia. Data for this study were collected from 342 household heads that were randomly selected from four rural kebeles. For Kitchen Performance Test (KPT), 25 ICS and 30 traditional cook stove (TCS) user households were selected using stratified random sampling. The data gathered through questionnaire were analyzed using descriptive statistics and binary logistic regression. The data gathered from KPT were analyzed using independent t-test. Accordingly, the regression result revealed that higher education level of household head, larger family size and presence of separate kitchen house were significantly and positively related to the adoption of ICS. On the other hand, having men-headed household was related negatively to the decision of households adopting ICS in a significant manner. The KPT result showed that an average of 1.12 (SD = 0.3) kg of firewood is consumed per day for each Standard Adult Equivalent (SAE) for TCS users while an average of 0.79 (SD = 0.2) kg of firewood is consumed per day for each SAE for ICS. The KPT result also showed that using an ICS results in an annual emission reduction of 0.494 tons of CO2 equivalent.