Can a problem plant clean up cooking for refugees?

USAFI Green are the winners of the 2023 Ashden Award for Powering Refugees and Displaced People, delivered in partnership with the Global Refugee Network and supported by NextEnergy Foundation, The Linbury Trust, JAC Trust, The Alan & Babette Sainsbury Charitable Fund. 

Smoke from open cooking fires and polluting stoves kills millions of people every year. Refugees are among those in greatest danger. But in Kenya’s Kakuma Refugee camp, residents are manufacturing a homegrown solution. Locally made cooking stoves from USAFI Green Energy protect people’s health, create jobs, and even help deal with invasive prosopis trees that dry out local land and harm cattle. Now communities can turn the nuisance plant into a useful fuel.