Publication - The forest cover impacts of improved cookstoves

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Title

The forest cover impacts of improved cookstoves

Publisher

IGC

Author

Abubakr Ayesh, Colette Salemi, Sebastian Anti

Published in

October 2026

Abstract

Improved cookstove programs are widely promoted for their health and energy benefits, yet there is little causal evidence on whether they reduce deforestation or increase forest cover. We study Tubeho Neza in Rwanda, a large-scale carbon-financed intervention that has distributed more than 1.5 million improved cookstoves since 2014. Exploiting the program’s staggered rollout across rural Rwanda, we estimate the effect of stove receipt on forest cover using the Mundlak difference-in-differences estimator. We combine stove distribution records with satellite-based measures of forest and non-forest vegetation including bespoke classifications predicted through

Machine Learning algorithms. We supplement our empirical findings with qualitative fieldwork including focus group discussions, district leader interviews, and community forest visits. Our estimates indicate that Tubeho Neza resulted in increased vegetation cover on average. Treated cells experienced a 0.61 percentage point increase in forest cover, a 1.256 percentage point increase in non-forest vegetation, and a 1.866 percentage point decline in non-vegetated area. We also find substantial heterogeneity: cells with relatively high pre-treatment forest cover experience larger forest gains, while cells with lower baseline forest cover mainly gain non-forest vegetation.

Taken together, the results suggest that large-scale improved cookstove distribution can improve landscape outcomes, including forest cover in ecologically favorable areas.

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• Cooking

• [[Template:Pub Tag Improved Cookstoves}]]

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