One-third of humanity prepares meals over open fires or polluting stoves, contributing to premature death and limiting human potential. Anne Hyre of the Bettering Human Lives Foundation joins The Crude Life to discuss this important energy poverty issue.
“The Bettering Human Lives Foundation aims to increase access to clean cooking fuels by directly supporting local innovators and entrepreneurs to start and grow their businesses,” Hyre said. “Together, we are committed to providing families with a pathway out of poverty through access to modern energy that betters human lives.”
The launch of the Bettering Human Lives Foundation (BHL Foundation) complements Liberty Energy’s initiatives focused on alleviating poverty.
“Currently, one-third of the global population relies on open fires or polluting stoves for meal preparation, contributing to poor health and premature deaths, and hindering human potential,” Hyre said. “This issue is urgent, and the foundation is committed to increasing access to clean cooking fuels.”
According to Hyre, the Bettering Human Lives Foundation aims to achieve its mission by directly supporting innovators and entrepreneurs in Africa and Asia, enabling them to establish and expand their businesses in the clean cooking sector.
“By fostering solutions at the grassroots level, the foundation seeks to empower communities and provide families with a viable pathway out of poverty through access to modern, clean energy,” she said.
Hyre has over 30 years of dedicated service in public health across Africa and Asia, and will play a pivotal role in steering the foundation’s clean cooking initiatives toward creating a lasting and positive impact on communities.
Furthermore, Liberty Energy has made an initial commitment of $1 million and is confident that the foundation will raise significant funds from others inside and outside our industry given the immense impact on human lives and opportunities provided by access to clean cooking fuels.
Chris Wright, Founder and CEO of Liberty Energy, expressed the company’s dedication to making a positive impact in their initial press release for the foundation.
“We believe that access to clean cooking fuels is the largest single step in the emergence from dire poverty,” Wright said. “Through the Bettering Human Lives Foundation, we are committed to supporting local initiatives that bring about lasting change and contribute to the well-being of individuals and families.”
The foundation’s initiatives will include financial support, mentorship programs, and partnerships with local organizations to advance clean cooking solutions. Liberty Energy invites collaboration from like-minded entities, philanthropists, and individuals who share the vision of a world where everyone cooks over clean-burning stoves, leading to improved health, economic prosperity, and a brighter future.
Hyre also responds to questions involving ESG (Environmental Social Governance). She discusses the release of their 2024 Bettering Human Lives report, which highlights the central role that energy plays in human lives, which ultimately demonstrates the ESG pillars in action.
Key Takeaways from the 2024 Bettering Human Lives Report:
- Energy is essential to life and the world needs more of it!
- The modern world today is powered by and made of hydrocarbons.
- Hydrocarbons are essential to improving the wealth, health, and life opportunities for the less energized seven billion people who aspire to be among the world’s lucky one billion.
- Hydrocarbons supply more than 80% of global energy and thousands of critical materials and products.
- The American Shale Revolution transformed energy markets, energy security, and geopolitics.
- Global demand for oil, natural gas, and coal are all at record levels and rising — no energy transition has begun.
- Modern alternatives, like solar and wind, provide only a part of electricity demand and do not replace the most critical uses of hydrocarbons. Energy-dense, reliable nuclear could be more impactful.
- Making energy more expensive or unreliable compromises people, national security, and the environment.
- Climate change is a global challenge but is far from the world’s greatest threat to human life.
- Zero Energy Poverty by 2050 is a superior goal compared to Net Zero emissions by 2050.
Here is a Letter from Anne Hyre also available to read on their website.
Despite significant cultural and geographical differences amongst countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, the scenes outside the window, as I drive from town to town, are remarkably similar, and all include women and girls standing in lines at water pumps, walking in groups in search of firewood and cow dung, and carrying heavy loads of firewood and water-filled buckets. Whether in Malawi, Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, or Kenya, I pass clusters of homes and see women cooking amidst harmful smoke from open fires that are fueled by wood or cow dung. We are in the year 2023… how is this acceptable? I feel so disheartened that the daily lives of women and girls in many lower-income countries continue to be filled with tedious, physically demanding, and often dangerous tasks of collecting fuel and water for cooking, cleaning, laundry, and heating homes.
I am a nurse-midwife, and I have spent the past 30 years working to improve poor-quality health services for women during pregnancy, childbirth, and the postpartum period. For 25 years, I worked primarily in Southeast Asia, where access to energy and sustained economic growth contributed to visible progress in improving health and quality of life. For the past 5 years, my work has shifted to Sub-Saharan Africa, and I have encountered a very different reality. Governments and donors have made huge investments in health over decades, and yet most countries in Sub-Saharan Africa remain far from reaching global targets for development in any social sector, including maternal and newborn health. I continually ask myself, “How can a woman possibly enjoy a healthy pregnancy, access health services, and demand better quality services when she spends her time collecting firewood, cooking over polluting stoves, and missing out on education and revenue-generating activities that ultimately translate into her ability to make decisions and take action to improve her family’s well-being?” Better health services are essential, but far from sufficient. There is a great need to tackle more fundamental problems that perpetually constrain women and their families.
A clean-burning cookstove, such as those powered by Liquified Petroleum Gas can be a life-changer for families, particularly women and girls.
It liberates them from the drudgery of collecting fuel and cooking in smoke-filled spaces, affording them time for school or other income-generating activities. It immediately improves their health, safety, and quality of life. The Bettering Human Lives Foundation will mobilize financial and human resources to support LPG and cookstove entrepreneurs and innovators in Africa and Asia with one goal in mind: get a clean cookstove into 1 million households. As a midwife and a mother, my heart breaks when I see a postpartum mother and her newborns inside dark, smoke-filled homes. I am eager to get on a more impactful path toward bettering human lives.
Onwards and Upwards,
Anne Hyre
For more information or to contact Hyre or Wright, click here
