Tonight at the Rose Café, Professor Blalock shared some startling statistics with us from his research on the effects of inefficient cook stoves on low-income Ugandans. While I was aware that the search for firewood could be very taxing on women who had to carry it for long distances, I was not aware that the smoke produced by burning this wood is also dangerous and leads to 4 million deaths every year. Professor Blalock noted that solutions exist in the form of more efficient stoves designed by U.S. universities, however the problem is that most Ugandans choose not to adopt these technologies even after they are educated about their benefits.

Before this lecture I would have found this fact very confusing, but Professor Blalock explained that reluctance to adopt new technologies is present in the United States as well. To illustrate this he asked for a show of hands as to how many people believed the environment was endangered by fuel-inefficient cars and everyone raised their hands. When he asked how many people actually drove fuel-efficient cars like Priuses, however, only four people in the room raised their hands. Professor Blalock then suggested that techniques that have been applied to the car industry could perhaps also be applicable to the problem of stove adoption, for instance offering financing and warranties. Hopefully, some of these strategies will have an impact in the future on this serious problem.