能源经济学研讨会

【总第70期】

Liquidity constraint, LPG stoves and charcoal consumption:a randomized controlled trial in Tanzania


本次能源经济学研讨会邀请到瑞典哥德堡大学Yonas Alem做学术演讲。
时间：5月25日，星期三，11:30—13:00
地点：中国人民大学明德主楼623会议室


报告摘要：
The high start-up cost of modern cooking appliances has been shown to be the key factor that hinders transition of households from biomass energy to clean energy in developing countries. We designed a randomised controlled trial to identify the impact of relaxing households’ liquidity constraints on LPG stove adoption and charcoal use in urban Tanzania. We show that, relative to households in the control group, adoption of LPG stoves reduced charcoal use by 47.5% in the treated group. However, providing subsidies for stove purchases resulted in a much larger reduction in charcoal use (54%) than did providing access to credit (41%). We highlight the importance of relaxing households’ financial constraints and improving access to credit to encourage urban households to switch to clean energy sources and save the remaining forest resources of Africa.


作者简介：
Yonas Alem is currently a research fellow at the Department of Economics, University of Gothenburg, where he received his PhD in Economics. He is also the research Director of the EfD network where he undertakes duties of reviewing research proposals, research deliverables and submissions for EfD discussion paper series by researchers in the network. He taught Economics and Econometrics courses at both graduate and undergraduate levels at various teaching institutions including the University of Gothenburg, the University of California Berkeley, Addis Ababa University, and the University of Dar es Salaam. His research covers a range of topics related to role of risk, shocks and poverty in influencing decisions and well-being of households in developing regions of the world, with a particular focus on Sub-Saharan Africa.


能源经济学研讨会（Energy Economics Seminar）由中国人民大学经济学院能源经济系定期推出，旨在为研究中国能源经济问题的学者提供交流的平台。

联系人：宋枫（songfeng@ruc.edu.cn）  

中国人民大学 经济学院能源经济系