By G. Bennie Bravo Johnson
With assistance from the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), Green Gold Liberia completed its second cycle Liberia clean energy eco-cook-stove training program in 2022.
Forty-five women from Bomi, Cape Mount, and Gbarpolu Counties graduated at the graduation ceremony, which was held on Friday, July 8, 2022 at the rural women’s facility in Tubmanburg, Bomi County.
with a certification in eco-cooking instruction for sustainable energy.
A social and environmental organization called the Green Gold Liberia Climate Change & Poverty Mitigator was established in 2014 by Joseph Hoffman in collaboration with rural people to plant native and exotic tree species on purchased deforested or degraded properties.
The GGL’s goals and objectives are to relieve pressure on Liberia’s remaining rainforest, mitigate deforestation and climate change, create green jobs and provide environmental services, restore and develop rural livelihoods, and lessen unemployment and poverty in rural communities. These challenges are brought on by global warming.
Aside from regular school lunches, Green Gold Liberia also offers teaching and learning resources to students in rural areas.
Morris F. Dougba, general manager of Green Gold Liberia, gave an overview of the training while claiming that the program’s goal was to preserve Liberia’s natural rainforest in addition to training women to make eco-cook-stoves. He claimed that the danger of using an eco-cook-stove was much lower than that of using a regular coal stove because it prevented trees from being cut down for the production of coal.
Furthermore, he said that the eco-cook-stove offers healthy advantages because it doesn’t emit smoke, which could have detrimental effects on health.
The Vice President of Liberia, Jewel Howard-Taylor, praised Green Gold Liberia and the UNDP for their ongoing contributions to the empowerment of women and the provision of a clean environment and urged all regional and international partners who are interested in a clean and healthy environment to participate in this fantastic transformational training.
The vice president also urged Green Gold Liberia and the UNDP to provide training programs in every nation so that local women can become economically independent nationwide.
“I would love for all of those who are concerned in climate change to hop on this project since it not only empowers those who have learned how to use it, but it also creates a clean environment.” We’ll eventually open Green Gold facilities in every county, according to Madam, so that people who have the necessary training can work there.
The Liberian Vice President also urged every Liberian to join the line for the use of the eco-cook-stove as it contains no risk of health danger because the trees are not to be cut down, which comes with the use of normal charcoal and the environmental challenges that come with it given the way in which normal charcoal is produced.
The vice president went on to lament that the natural rainforest of Liberia is the last remaining ecosystem in all of West Africa that can absorb the significant amounts of carbon dioxide created by the region’s industrial sectors. As a result, using the eco-cook-stove will help Liberia maintain its natural rainforest and improve its environmental sustainability.
By offering a means for more training to inform more people about the creation and usage of the eco-cook-stove, she urged the government, through the director of the environmental protection agency EPA, to get proactive in using the eco-cook-stove.
She urged the Environmental Protection Agency to collaborate with Green Gold Liberia in order to promote eco-cook-stoves on a global scale. saying that eco-cook-stoves would have gone worldwide long ago if Ghana or other countries were interested.
Madam Taylor also gave out sanitary pads to the schoolgirls who attended the graduation ceremony while admonishing them to pursue their studies with positivity and fervor in order to have a greater beneficial impact on society.
While urging the EPA to include the development of the training facility in their work plan, UNDP national representative Hon. Stephen Rodriques pledged UNDP commitment to creating eco-cook-stove training centers in every county, claiming that the UNDP’s agenda is dictated by the EPA work plan
