VOA常速英语2007年-Household Cooking Emissions Claim Tens of Thous

By Anjana Pasricha
New Delhi
04 December 2007

The fumes¹ from household cooking fuels pose a huge and largely unrecognized health hazard to inhabitants, especially women and children -and India, with its huge rural population, suffers an inordinate² number of deaths from cooking fumes. As Anjana Pasricha reports from New Delhi, health campaigners say rural households must switch to cooking stoves that cause less pollution.

It is a common sight across Indian villages: women cooking the family meal on traditional stoves that burn wood, leaves or animal dung.

Few people - including the women themselves - realize that the black, acrid³ smoke that billows from these kitchen fires is a silent killer⁴.

Scientists say the fuel in primitive⁵ stoves fails to burn completely, and produces poisonous pollutants⁶ such as carbon monoxide. Those who inhale⁷ this smoke regularly become vulnerable to acute respiratory ailments⁸ such as asthma⁹, chronic¹⁰ bronchitis, and can even develop tuberculosis¹¹ and lung cancer.

The World Health Organization says the scale of the problem is massive in India, where 650 million people depend on cheap fuels for cooking.

The National Officer for Sustainable Development at WHO's India office, A.K. Sengupta, says household smoke claims tens of thousands of lives across the country, mostly in poor rural homes.

"Indoor air pollution is almost four, five times more problematic than outdoor air pollution, and there are almost 400,000 deaths per year due to indoor air pollution," Sengupta said. " The rural population is quite big and alternate fuels are not easily available."

The WHO says India accounts for roughly one-third of the one and a half million deaths caused worldwide by use of cheap cooking fuels every year.

Most of the victims are women and children because women traditionally do the cooking, and children stay at home with them. In fact mothers often cook with babies in their arms, exposing the infants directly to the toxic¹² smoke.

Health campaigners say the best way to reduce the hazard is to provide poor communities with improved stoves that give out fewer emissions¹³.

A handful of government-sponsored programs to design and distribute such stoves have been undertaken, but they have met with little success so far.

For example a project in Maharashtra state to distribute pollution-reducing stoves to rural homes flopped¹⁴. Village women simply discarded the stoves, known in India as "chullahs."

 

Rashmi Patil, a professor at the Center for Environmental Science and Engineering at the Indian Institute of Technology in Mumbai, explains why rural communities rejected the chullahs.

"The scheme is not very popular, it was not very successful…the villagers are reluctant to use them because they are not trained how to use them," Patil said. "Suppose some part goes out, their own chullahs they can repair, but these chullahs, the parts are not available, they cannot repair it themselves…. The benefits of the chullah was not explained to them, no training was given to them on the maintenance of the chullah."

Patil says experts are trying to rectify¹⁵ these problems by designing stoves that are easy to maintain. They are also launching education programs to raise awareness¹⁶ about the need to switch to better stoves.

Some voluntary agencies have also undertaken initiatives to design less-polluting stoves.

The Shell Foundation, a Britain-based charity organization, is working with local groups in India to develop and market clean cooking stoves for rural communities.

The director of the Shell Foundation, Kurt Hoffman, says the stoves are being sold, not distributed free of cost, because the profit motive¹⁷ ensures that a viable¹⁸ product is developed for the consumer. He says the foundation is involving local markets and women's groups to reach village homes.

Hoffman says the program began three years ago, and has begun reaching rural communities in several parts of the country.

"It is a trial-and-error process, so in the early stages we found or our partners found that there were lots of complaints, and the stoves were rejected," explained Hoffman. "Over time, the products have become better. There is a particular product similar to a pressure cooker almost that has been fantastically successful."

However, the need is so huge that such initiatives cannot meet the demand. For example, Shell has sold about one hundred thousand stoves in Maharashtra state - but the need is for 10 million.

Experts say in the long run, countries like India must move to using cleaner fuels - but given the massive poverty, this could still be decades away.

1 fumes   

n.(强烈而刺激的)气味，气体

参考例句：

• The health of our children is being endangered by exhaust fumes. 我们孩子们的健康正受到排放出的废气的损害。
• Exhaust fumes are bad for your health. 废气对健康有害。

2 inordinate   

adj.无节制的；过度的

参考例句：

• The idea of this gave me inordinate pleasure.我想到这一点感到非常高兴。
• James hints that his heroine's demands on life are inordinate.詹姆斯暗示他的女主人公对于人生过于苛求。

3 acrid   

adj.辛辣的，尖刻的，刻薄的

参考例句：

• There is an acrid tone to your remarks.你说这些话的口气带有讥刺意味。
• The room was filled with acrid smoke.房里充满刺鼻的烟。

4 killer   

n.杀人者，杀人犯，杀手，屠杀者

参考例句：

• Heart attacks have become Britain's No.1 killer disease.心脏病已成为英国的头号致命疾病。
• The bulk of the evidence points to him as her killer.大量证据证明是他杀死她的。

5 primitive   

adj.原始的；简单的；n.原(始)人，原始事物

参考例句：

• It is a primitive instinct to flee a place of danger.逃离危险的地方是一种原始本能。
• His book describes the march of the civilization of a primitive society.他的著作描述了一个原始社会的开化过程。

6 pollutants   

污染物质（尤指工业废物）( pollutant的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• Pollutants are constantly being released into the atmosphere. 污染物质正在不断地被排放到大气中去。
• The 1987 Amendments limit 301(g) discharges to a few well-studied nonconventional pollutants. 1987年的修正案把第301条（g）的普通排放限制施加在一些认真研究过的几种非常规污染物上。 来自英汉非文学 - 环境法 - 环境法

7 inhale   

v.吸入(气体等)，吸(烟)

参考例句：

• Don't inhale dust into your lung.别把灰尘吸进肺里。
• They are pleased to not inhale second hand smoke.他们很高兴他们再也不会吸到二手烟了。

8 ailments   

疾病（尤指慢性病），不适( ailment的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• His ailments include a mild heart attack and arthritis. 他患有轻度心脏病和关节炎。
• He hospitalizes patients for minor ailments. 他把只有小病的患者也送进医院。

9 asthma   

n.气喘病，哮喘病

参考例句：

• I think he's having an asthma attack.我想他现在是哮喘病发作了。
• Its presence in allergic asthma is well known.它在过敏性气喘中的存在是大家很熟悉的。

10 chronic   

adj.(疾病)长期未愈的，慢性的；极坏的

参考例句：

• Famine differs from chronic malnutrition.饥荒不同于慢性营养不良。
• Chronic poisoning may lead to death from inanition.慢性中毒也可能由虚弱导致死亡。

11 tuberculosis   

n.结核病，肺结核

参考例句：

• People used to go to special health spring to recover from tuberculosis.人们常去温泉疗养胜地治疗肺结核。
• Tuberculosis is a curable disease.肺结核是一种可治愈的病。

12 toxic   

adj.有毒的，因中毒引起的

参考例句：

• The factory had accidentally released a quantity of toxic waste into the sea.这家工厂意外泄漏大量有毒废物到海中。
• There is a risk that toxic chemicals might be blasted into the atmosphere.爆炸后有毒化学物质可能会进入大气层。

13 emissions   

排放物( emission的名词复数 )； 散发物（尤指气体）

参考例句：

• Most scientists accept that climate change is linked to carbon emissions. 大多数科学家都相信气候变化与排放的含碳气体有关。
• Dangerous emissions radiate from plutonium. 危险的辐射物从钚放散出来。

14 flopped   

v.（指书、戏剧等）彻底失败( flop的过去式和过去分词 )；（因疲惫而）猛然坐下；（笨拙地、不由自主地或松弛地）移动或落下；砸锅

参考例句：

• Exhausted, he flopped down into a chair. 他筋疲力尽，一屁股坐到椅子上。
• It was a surprise to us when his play flopped. 他那出戏一败涂地，出乎我们的预料。 来自《简明英汉词典》

15 rectify   

v.订正，矫正，改正

参考例句：

• The matter will rectify itself in a few days.那件事过几天就会变好。
• You can rectify this fault if you insert a slash.插人一条斜线便可以纠正此错误。

16 awareness   

n.意识，觉悟，懂事，明智

参考例句：

• There is a general awareness that smoking is harmful.人们普遍认识到吸烟有害健康。
• Environmental awareness has increased over the years.这些年来人们的环境意识增强了。

17 motive   

n.动机，目的；adv.发动的，运动的

参考例句：

• The police could not find a motive for the murder.警察不能找到谋杀的动机。
• He had some motive in telling this fable.他讲这寓言故事是有用意的。

18 viable   

adj.可行的，切实可行的，能活下去的

参考例句：

• The scheme is economically viable.这个计划从经济效益来看是可行的。
• The economy of the country is not viable.这个国家经济是难以维持的。