A new month gets going in Kampala, and we are always moving around the city to not only monitor the kitchens of those schools included under our Project Activity registered with the Gold Standard.

We are constantly checking on schools outside our project, to learn from their cooking practices and behaviors, even when they are still using traditional methods.

New stove manufacturers come into the sector with different technologies and proposals, and understanding the user preferences is key to improving what we do at Simoshi. For example, we have seen in the past stoves powered with solar panels, and it is so unfortunate to see them broken and no longer in use, as a result of lack of maintenance. The main problem reported by the school is either broken panels, or expired batteries. Such issues could be easily resolved, if customer support was provided.

That is why, no matter which cooking technology is introduced, it is crucial to provide a 10-year warranty and maintenance service, to ensure schools do not resort back to traditional 3-stone fires ever again.