Rohingya are an ethnic minority group in Myanmar, formerly Burma, who occupy the western littoral state of Rakhine. The onset of violence in August 2017 has prompted the greater part of a million Rohingyas to cross the border to Bangladesh. Currently, there are 900,000 refugees in Cox’s Bazaar. Rationed food supplies of pulses, oil and rice are provided. However, cooking fuel is procured by trekking to the peripheries of the forest near the camps and chopping down trees or on the black market through a barter system.

The project provides a complementary service to the uprooted men, women and children to alleviate food shortage and provide clean drinking water. To counteract with the household air pollution VNV Advisory along with our on-ground partners, plans to provide 50,000 of these families with improved smokeless cookstoves.

The local administration will help in the deployment of the stoves and its subsequent monitoring. The project aims to provide a whole-scale solution to the problem of food shortage and clean water access. The project builds technological self-reliance through training and optimizes energy efficiency. The project also protects the ecological component around refugee camps.

Being smokeless, the cookstoves reduce indoor air pollution. This facilitates the ability to boil water for clean drinking water access. The project also reduces the Impact on Bangladesh’s vulnerable biodiversity.