IN-DEPTH: Cookstoves NGO faces funding crunch as donors pull plug

Quantum Commodity Intelligence – A US-based not-for-profit that has a key role in designing a new methodology for cleaner cookstoves carbon projects is facing a funding crisis, after major donor countries Canada, Norway and the Netherlands decided to cease financing amid spending pressures.

Meanwhile, further US government donations look highly uncertain if Donald Trump wins next month's presidential election.

Washington DC-based Clean Cooking Alliance (CCA) has already had two rounds of job losses earlier this year, based on announcements seen by Quantum and comments from former staffers.

The decisions to cut jobs came in the wake of Norway and Canada deciding to cease funding and uncertainty about other sources of finance, while, in the past week, the Netherlands' government has also confirmed it will stop financing CCA from the end of this year.

"Losing funding is really challenging for CCA's leadership," said one former staffer, who acknowledged that lack of delivery by the organisation in some areas hadn't been a good look. 

"But there's pieces of the game that are still really strong, such as the work that's developing the Clear methodology," they added.

The CCA has a major presence in the cleaner cookstoves sector, and as part of the '4C' consortium is in the later stages of developing a new methodology known as Comprehensive Lowered Emission Assessment and Reporting (Clear) for use in both the voluntary carbon market and the Paris Agreement's Article 6.

Committed

CCA responded to questions about its funding level by saying it "remains fully committed to advancing our mission of achieving universal access to modern, affordable, and clean cooking solutions."

It said: "Given the reality of geopolitical factors influencing bilateral donor funding, we are continually adapting to this external environment to ensure that CCA remains right-sized to deliver on critical priorities, such as promoting responsible carbon finance for clean cooking."

Under the Clear methodology, which will be much more conservative in terms of crediting than many older methodologies, project developers are required to continuously monitor the use and performance of a multitude of stove types financed through carbon credit revenue.

4C hopes it will become the default blueprint for the sector, with several standards including Gold Standard, Global Carbon Council and Cercarbono likely to adopt it.

The CCA has a high profile in NGO and development circles because it gets logistical, but not financial, support from the UN Foundation, a $1 billion charitable organisation that supports the delivery of sustainable development goals.

The cookstove not-for-profit's 'Leadership Council' lists prominent figures in global development circles.

They include: Hillary Rodham Clinton, former US Secretary of State and presidential candidate; Wanjira Mathai, managing director for Africa and Global Partnerships at the World Resources Institute; and former President of Ireland, Mary Robinson.

CCA's website also names Hollywood actor Julia Roberts, Ghanaian musician Rocky Dawuni and founder of NGO World Central Kitchen José Andrés as 'champions' of the organisation.

Scrutiny

Suggestions by some former staffers that the CCA will struggle to survive in current form, and that some more of its remaining pool of expertise will have to find roles elsewhere in climate finance and carbon trading, comes during a year in which the cookstoves sector has been under intense scrutiny.

A peer-reviewed paper from US researchers in January alleged that some cookstoves projects were over-credited tenfold with carbon offsets because of flawed methodologies, while US regulators at various stages this year have moved to improve disclosures on the quality of credits.

Meanwhile, indictments earlier this month of former executives at cookstoves project developer C-Quest Capital (CQC), including its founder Ken Newcombe, on charges of fraud, have served as another reminder for buyers and developers of the need for newer, more detailed methodologies.

Because methodologies – many of which are likely to adopt the fundamentals of Clear – are integral to how many credits are issued per project, alignment with integrity initiatives is expected to have a major bearing on supply in the voluntary carbon market.

But former and current staffers at CCA warn that the collapse in funding for the organisation means future initiatives to increase the reach of higher-quality cookstoves are at risk.

In addition, they have also questioned the organisation's track record in delivering various major projects and initiatives, and how the CCA has used public money.

Some former staffers pointed out that a 'system strategy' announced at a 2019 clean cooking forum in Nairobi, with a budget of over $900,000 and subcontracted to consultancy firm Dahlberg, has delivered little in terms of tangible activities that are advancing cleaner cooking. 

Former staffers also point out that there has been little or no tangible outcome from the strategy's 'delivery units' set up by CCA in Kenya and Sierra Leone aimed at accelerating access to better cookstoves, mainly through private-sector investment and carbon finance.

CCA did not provide answers that specifically addressed the progress of the strategy, but did reply with the following:

"As required by funders, CCA also conducts funder-specific and funder-guided audits and assessments of both programs and financials. The UN Foundation's annual audits are presented to the UN Foundation Board of Directors and made public." 

Salaries

Meanwhile, some former employees cite the annual salary – and expenses, including huge hotel bills and regular flights to her native country, the Netherlands – of chief executive Dymphna van der Lans as excessive at a time that the organisation has had to drastically tighten its belt. 

According to a 'Form 990' financial filing, van der Lans was the second-highest earner of UN Foundation staff in financial year 2022, with compensation totalling as $359,074 in salary and other benefits.

CCA said that in common with many global organisations, travel is often scheduled at the request of specific donors and partners. 

It added: "The UN Foundation was awarded the highest four-star rating from Charity Navigator, the largest and most utilised charity evaluator in the United States."

Donors contacted by Quantum cited pressures on aid budgets and the availability of other funding mechanisms as reasons why they had cut funding, rather than any specifics related to CCA.

A spokesperson for the Netherlands Ministry of Foreign Affairs said the "ministry is exploring other possibilities to contribute to organisations working on energy access."

This will include contributing to an initiative that will support the CCA as well, the spokesperson said.

"The details are still being discussed," the spokesperson added.

The Netherlands' contribution to the CCA has totalled $14 million to date. 

Cookstoves controversies

The Netherlands' government's role in clean cooking came under public scrutiny recently amid reports highlighting a $6.4 million dollar investment, effective 2022, in CQC by Dutch development bank FMO – which manages funds for the Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Economic Affairs.

Although the fraud alleged of Newcombe and two other former senior executives only came to light earlier this year, CQC's cookstoves have long been the subject of criticism by NGOs, academics and many buyers within the VCM for being substandard.

Under Newcombe's leadership, which ended at the start of this year, CQC, like many other companies in the cookstoves sector, was active in CCA and had lobbied against some of the methodology changes being proposed by CCA.

"I don't see the carbon controversy as being a significant contributor to donor decisions – donors support clean cooking because of the multitude of impacts including health, women's empowerment," a former employee said.

"I would guess that there are other things that are more impactful like cuts to the Netherlands' 2025 development aid budget just last month, as well as other unexpected crises like Ukraine that are impacting aid budgets," he added.

"Norway is now shifting its support towards companies and organisations that are directly invested in developing, producing and distributing modern cooking solutions," Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation (Norad) told Quantum.

Norway, along with other Nordic countries such as Sweden and Finland, is also active in financing cookstoves through the Modern Cooking Facility for Africa, which provides results-based finance to innovative cookstoves that favour non-firewood feedstocks.

The clean cooking challenge

The country was a co-convener of a cookstoves summit in Paris in May with the UN, the International Energy Agency and the French government.

Around $2 billion was pledged to help advance cleaner cooking, reduce deforestation and slash exposure to harmful smoke, as well as reduce the risk of harm to women and children that have to walk long distances to collect fuel for cooking food and heating.

But this sum is viewed by African governments and development groups as far below what's needed to deliver improved outcomes on cleaner cooking for over a billion people who rely on firewood, and demands for an effective, sufficiently resourced and transparent global finance vehicle represent a major task for UN climate talks in Baku next month.