Abstract
Transitions to clean cooking in urban sub-Saharan Africa do not typically occur as a straightforward “switch.” Instead, households often create hybrid fuel combinations that incorporate LPG, electricity, and residual biomass, influenced by factors such as cash flow, socket availability, landlord regulations, vendor reliability, and gender dynamics. Utilising urban ethnography and practice theory, I present the Appropriation Threshold (AT)—the juncture at which a new cooking device or fuel achieves social legitimacy, material security, financial feasibility, and temporal authorisation within the household. AT consists of four conditions: (1) trusted supply and safety visibility (reliable refill/vendor, visible safety practices), (2) secure emplacement (grounded outlets, shelves, surge-protected splitters), (3) authorised time-of-use (prepaid SIM/top-up control aligned with household rhythms), and (4) sensory legitimacy (food quality, acceptable smoke/odour/noise to key decision-makers). This study elucidates the transition of households from trial usage to routine adoption of alternative technologies and examines the persistence of fuel stacking, even in the presence of access to LPG or electricity. This analysis reconceptualises adoption as appropriation, emphasises program levers such as PAYG design, socket upgrades, and vendor certification, and suggests audit-ready indicators for monitoring hybrid transitions in rapidly electrifying African cities.
Presenters
Jeremiah ThoronkaStudent, Postgraudate, School of Global Studies, Krung Thep Maha Nakhon [Bangkok], Thailand
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
KEYWORDS
Clean cooking, Innovation diffusion, Domestication, Appropriation, Adoption
