Africa’s Clean Cooking Moment: What Governments and Investors Must Deliver Before Nairobi 2027

The African Development Bank is urging African governments to turn clean cooking pledges into affordable, reliable services for nearly one billion people who still lack access. Ahead of the January 2027 Nairobi summit, policymakers, development partners and businesses face a test: deliver funding and track whether households keep using cleaner options.

Nearly one billion Africans still lack access to clean cooking. For many families, preparing a meal means breathing smoke from wood or charcoal fires and spending hours obtaining fuel. The African Development Bank Group wants governments to treat that daily burden as a central part of Africa's energy transition, alongside the drive to expand electricity.

The bank made its appeal at a high-level event during the United Nations General Assembly on 22 September 2026. Leaders and development partners discussed how to accelerate access ahead of the next Summit on Clean Cooking in Africa, scheduled for 27–28 January 2027 in Nairobi. The test between now and then is whether political commitments become affordable services that households can use every day.

The Cost of Cooking Reaches Beyond the Kitchen

Dependence on polluting fuels affects health, household finances and opportunity. Women and children often spend time gathering fuel and face prolonged exposure to smoke. Time spent finding wood cannot also be spent in school, paid work or running a business. Heavy reliance on biomass can add pressure to forests.

For African governments, clean cooking is therefore a health, education, economic and environmental issue as well as an energy issue. A successful programme could ease several burdens at once. But providing a new stove is only the beginning: if fuel is costly, unavailable or unsuitable for a family's cooking needs, households may return to their old methods.

Energy Compacts Need Plans Families Can Use

Clean cooking ambitions now appear in all 36 National Energy Compacts adopted under Mission 300, the African Development Bank and World Bank initiative that aims to connect 300 million Africans to electricity by 2030. Bringing cooking into those plans gives governments a way to coordinate household energy investments. It does not guarantee that electricity connections will translate into cleaner cooking.

The choices will differ by location. Electric cooking requires reliable power and affordable appliances. Liquefied petroleum gas depends on accessible refills and distribution networks. Biogas, bioethanol and other options need suitable local supply chains. Policymakers should identify which solutions work in specific communities, publish delivery targets and assign responsibility for meeting them.

Progress also needs careful measurement. Governments should track whether households continue using cleaner options, what they pay over time and which communities remain underserved. Those figures would give citizens and investors a clearer picture than appliance sales alone.

Financing Must Close the Last-Mile Gap

Following the first Summit on Clean Cooking in Africa in 2024, the African Development Bank Group pledged to channel $2 billion into the sector over ten years. It says it has directed approximately $135 million to clean cooking projects so far, around ten times its cumulative financing before that summit.

The bank is supporting different delivery approaches. Its work includes biogas and efficient electric cooking appliances in Uganda, electric cooking within wider electrification investments in Tanzania, and results-based financing designed to reach 100,000 households and 300 institutions in Rwanda. These projects may help show which combinations of finance, technology and distribution can expand sustained use.

For development partners, the priority is to make funding effective where household costs or delivery risks hold back adoption. Equipment support alone may fall short if families cannot afford fuel or repairs. Concessional finance can help reach harder-to-serve communities, while transparent results can show which programmes deserve to grow.

Nairobi's Test: Commitments That Change Daily Life

Clean cooking also presents an opportunity for appliance makers, fuel suppliers, distributors and lenders. Yet firms need predictable rules and evidence that customers can afford to keep using their products. Investors and shareholders will look for viable supply chains, realistic payment models and clear public policy.

The Nairobi summit gives governments and partners a deadline to move beyond declarations. Useful outcomes would include funded national plans, timelines for reaching households and public reporting on affordability and continued use. Private firms can then make better decisions about where to invest, while development partners can target support where commercial markets alone are unlikely to reach families.

For Africa, the measure of success is straightforward: fewer people forced to rely on polluting fuels to cook a meal. Meeting that goal will require governments, financiers and businesses to keep working together long after the summit ends.