A don, Prof. Christian Madu with the University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN), on Saturday urged Federal Government to subsidise the cost of cooking gas for low-income households.
The popular cooking gas is also officially known as Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG).
Madu, a Professor of Environmental Management and Control, made the call while speaking with NAN in Enugu on the need to checkmate rising cost of cooking gas to forestall its negative consequences on the environment.
He spoke on the sidelines of the impact of the rising cost of cooking gas on the gains made by the country in checking greenhouse gases, felling of trees and deforestation.
According to him, the high price of cooking gas should be checkmated to avoid its potential consequences on the environment, especially by subsidising it for rural communities already given free cylinders by the Federal Government.
“The rising price of cooking gas may erode all the gains made in sensitising many households in rural communities, on the need to switch to the use of cooking gas as a cleaner and sustainable environmental option.
“The rural dwellers and the poor will actually bear the brunt of this.
“With the continuous meltdown in the economy, more and more people may switch back to the use of firewood, charcoal, and other unsustainable practices for cooking.
“These efforts will increase the generation of greenhouse gases, especially carbon into the atmosphere.
“This will defeat the efforts the government had made by giving out free gas cylinders as incentive to shift to the use of cooking gas or LNG.
“It is of utmost importance to maintain the trust of the people. If this initiative fails, it will be very difficult to sell other programmes that may support climate change mitigation.
“Of course, we would not want people to go back to fetching of firewood because this act contributes significantly to deforestation and the burning of the firewood generates carbon into the atmosphere,” he said.
Madu, who is a supervisor of lead researchers at the Centre for Environmental Management and Control, UNN, said that the poor households already using cooking gas have very little viable short-term options to cooking gas.
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He noted that the uses of charcoal stoves and firewood are not environmentally friendly; while electric stoves could have been suggested but the electric tariff remained high and its attendant epileptic supply.
“Further, for people in the rural communities, there may actually be no power supply. This option may also require investing in electric stoves since they are not widely used.
“Kerosene stoves may be appealing because they are widely available. However, kerosene is not a source of clean energy because of the higher emission of carbon,” he said.
The don noted that the best short-term option now is for the government to find ways to remain focused on the use of cooking gas.
“There may be need to develop subsidy programmes to control the cost, and relax some of the taxes and regulations that may contribute to the high cost of cooking gas.
“It is very important to protect the gains that have been achieved towards zero emission of greenhouse gases in the country.
“In the long-term, there are other safe and eco-friendly alternatives that may be developed. For example, the bio-gas technology is booming in many countries.
“Bio-gas can be harvested from soak-a-ways and other animal wastes and food waste by using a bio-digester.
“Portable bio-digesters can be bought for family use to supply the needed bio gas for cooking.
“This will be a cheaper alternative in the end. Even though the initial investment may be high, the long-term return may justify the investment. Bio gas is environmentally friendly,’’ he noted. (NAN)
