Willingness to Switch From Charcoal to Alternative Energy Sources in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

Abstract

A majority of the developing countries are characterised by poor performance of the power sector and traditional energy, poor transition from traditional to modern energies. The aspect of cooking fuel choice has been in theory explained by energy ladder theory. According to this theory, households tend to switch from one fuel to another, climbing up a ladder towards more modern energy sources as the income level improves. However, recent observation in developing countries has shown that households do not do a complete switch but rather, consume multiple fuels. Moreover, income has been found as not the only factor influencing the switching patterns of households, thus resulting to a fuel stack hypothesis which has been supported by a number of researchers.  Motivated by this fact, and using a sample of 562 randomly selected households from the three municipals of Dar es Salaam region, this study assesses factors that may influence households to switch from charcoal to alternative clean energy sources. It uses logit regression analysis to analyse the data obtained. Descriptive analysis shows that about 20 and 25 percent of the households are still not aware of charcoal indoor pollution and associated health problems, respectively. Also, about 20 percent perceive charcoal as easier to use while only 5 percent state that food cooked using charcoal tastes more delicious that that cooked using other sources of energy. Furthermore, regression analysis finds that household's head age, gender, occupation, expenditure, home ownership, convenience of charcoal and unreliability of modern fuels to be significant factors in explaining such transition. Keywords: Charcoal, urban, cooking fuel, switch, logit regression JEL Classification: Q4, Q41