Rasoi Ghar - A Successful CSR Initiative for Rural Development in India(PPT)

摘要

Indian rural sector uses traditional fuels such as wood and dung cakes which releases hazardous chemicals including hydrocarbons, carbon monoxide and sulphur oxides. With cooking spaces often poorly ventilated, exposure to these fumes heightens the risk of respiratory diseases. These traditional fuels also pose a number of disadvantages, burning inefficiently and in a manner that is difficult to control. Collection of traditional fuel is also arduous and time-consuming, with the average villager spending a significant portion of time and income in securing daily energy requirements. The modern cooking fuel of LPG represents a welcome alternative to traditional fuels but, however, is still not yet affordable by the poor. Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited (HPCL), India has initiated a Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) initiative called 'Rasoi Ghar' which is a community kitchen shared by several households of one village. The concept is to make cleaner fuel accessible to rural communities and give them better health, hygiene and safety. Centrally located in a village, the Rasoi Ghar is a ready kitchen set up in a well-constructed house, allowing several villagers to cook their daily meals at a time. Each Rasoi Ghar is equipped with adequate water supply, cooking slab, basic cooking utensils and minimum number of stoves connected to replaceable LPG cylinders. Recently, HPCL has constructed Rasoi Ghar kitchen with adequate number of LPG stoves in a north east Bangalore village named Tarabahalli. To improve the cooking efficiency, the community kitchen was provided with utensils such as pressure cookers to every family in the village. This CSR initiative of Rasoi Ghar was widely appreciated by rural folks at Tarabahalli village which has helped the poor families in the village to use clean, safe and efficient fuel for cooking and thus enabling them better health and focus on improvement of their daily livelihoods.