Dr. Jyoti Parikh
Executive Director
Integrated Research and Action for
Development (IRADe)

• “
Fifty eight years after independence, Indian women still toil daily to collect fuel wood, crop residues and animal dung. Its time to make an impact on the lives of women who live in the 19th century, if not in the
16th century.
”
“Although this is another first in budget making in India, it is only a beginning……. all departments will be required to present gender budgets as well as make benefit incidence analysis.
”
Finance Minister P. Chidambaram in Budget 2005 speech

Modern/ Not Modern is Relative
•
Modern or Clean: LPG, Electricity, Biogas, Kerosene
•
Lighting: Dirty Fuels
Inferior/ Not modern
•
Cooking: Cleaner Fuels (Pressure Stove)
Less Clean (Wick Stove)
• Kerosene is superior compared to bio-fuels
•
Could be bought in flexible quantity with low fixed costs with more distribution network than LPG

Household energy – Rural India

95.6% of households (HHs) use biofuels

89 million households spend 31 billion hours annually in biofuel gathering

16.5% use kerosene for cooking

5.4% use LPG for cooking. Most of them however use multiple fuels

0.3% HHs use Biogas for cooking

63% of HHs are electrified

Accessibility of electricity vs use of clean fuels for cooking (population in million)
Fuels Total Electricity
(Yes)
94
Electricity
(No)
23 117 Kerosene/
LPG(Yes)
Kerosene/
LPG(No)
Total
352
446
273
296
625
742
SOURCE: Census 2001 data
“People without fuels much larger in number than without electricity”

Electricity? Or Fuels?
Why more electricity? Why not fuels?

Politically or technically electricity is pushed more than fuels despite the fact that it is costlier than providing fuel
 “Electricity for all” goal since mid seventies

Rural Electrification Corporation

Less Empowerment of Women

Special Targets and budgets (insufficient)
Is providing fuels such a formidable task?

Drudgery in Collection of Fuels
Women have to walk every month in the state , spending 23 hours during 8 trips , each of about 3 kms to fetch fuels
Time and efforts for collection of fuelwoods
Distance travelled Households
HHs collecting from up to 1 km
HHs collecting between 1 - 2 km
HHs collecting from 2 - 3 km
HHs collecting from more than 3 km
Average time spent per trip (hours)
Average no. of trips per household per month
42%
50%
5%
3%
2. 9
8.0
Average time spent per month per household 40.8%
IRADe survey : Uttar Pradesh

Health impacts of Collection of Fuels
– Results in backache (50%), neck ache, headache and bruises every week (80 %)
– 19% persons in HP have some symptoms
IRADe survey : Himachal Pradesh

A ll India Rural
• Can be viewed at least as an economic problem if not a drudgery problem.
• In Rural India
– Nearly 3 billion days are spent in gathering fuels and 700 million days in processing them
– About 800 million days are spent due to diseases
– Add to these
12 billion days to fetch water and water related diseases

Impact on MDG (Current Indian scenario)

Infant and under 5 mortality rate in India are amongst the highest in the world. India’s child mortality rate at 87 is higher than even its poor neighbours Bangladesh (69), Bhutan (85) and
Nepal(82).
Source: Securing health – citizens report on MDGs

The most recent estimates put Maternal Mortality
Rate (MMR) in India as 408 .
National Family Health Survey (NFHS) 2

Energy and Millenium Development Goal (MDG) attainment
Millenium
Development
Goals
How energy can help?
Goal 4: Reduce child mortality
(by 66% the mortality rate)
Goal 5: Improve maternal health
(by 75% the maternity mortality rates)
•
Indoor air pollution
• Fuel supply
•
Work burden
•
Kerosene and LPG
Goal 7: Ensure
Environmental
Sustainability
Goal 8: Safe drinking
Water and Sanitation
•
Deforestation
•
Indoor pollution
• Climate change
•
Water & sanitation
• Energy consumption

Wish to shift to clean fuels. Why?
Example in HP, Shimla
Yes (82.5%)
Reason Response %
No (17.5%)
Reason Response %
Convenient (to turn on/off) 18.00
It is expensive 49.00
Time Saving
Cleaner Household
Easy Accessibility
Total
39.00
36.00
7.00
100.00
The place is too far
Supply is
Inadequate
We do not need it
We Forgo our Share of Ration
Total
5.00
7.50
26.00
12.50
100.00

Willingness to pay
Purchase of Kerosene
50
40
30
20
10
0
90
80
70
60
Tamil Nadu Rajasthan HP UP
Ration Price % hh
Market Price
% hh

Budgeting for gender I
Energy
• A national mission on “Cooking fuel availability to rural women within 1km
”similar to Rajiv Gandhi mission for drinking water
-For example, women groups can form tree growing cooperatives
• Micro enterprise development
• Policy needs to go beyond cooking energy
• Paradigm shift from subsidy mind sets to micro credit and loans (to encourage SHGs)
• Access to energy as promotional incentives for running small-scale energy business units

Budgeting for gender II
Employment & Capacity building
• Enhance the employment opportunities for women
• Promotion of local resources
• Continuation of current programs
• Provide special trainings and special fellowships for Women
• Capacity building and assistance to manage energy programs
• Widen access to rural electrification, including decentralized programs
• “Indhan, Pani, Bijlee” should be given political priority over
“Indhan, Bijlee”

Budgeting for gender III
Health
•
Sensitize health centers
• Spot respiratory diseases from indoor air pollution
• Reduce daily drudgery: only then can women spend time generating income
• Gender should be fully taken into account

Budgeting for gender IV
Education
• Launching mass education programmes especially for the girl child to achieve the
MDG
• Use of media and electronic communication to educate the public and raise awareness
• Dissemination activities/information sharing national, international experiences

“One-third of India’s total energy, is ‘managed’ mostly by women with too little inputs of investment, management or technology (IMT) and no political or administrative backing. These women energy suppliers or “managers” need to be helped without taking this role away from them and instead provide them IMT and improve their lives.”
Jyoti Parikh, Business Standard