Clean cookstoves bring healthier air to farming communities

Across many of the regions where we grow bananas, pineapples, and other tropical fruit, the daily rhythm of life begins with fire. In rural villages near our plantations, families often cook over open flames or simple stoves fuelled by wood and charcoal. It is a practice passed down through generations, but it carries heavy costs that are not always visible at first glance.

At Fresh Del Monte Produce, sustainability reaches beyond the farm gate. We invest in the communities that host our operations because the wellbeing of workers, their families, and neighbours shapes the long-term health of the land and the business. A healthier home means a stronger workforce and a brighter future for the next generation.

The smoke from traditional cookstoves fills kitchens with harmful pollutants. Women and children, who spend the most time near the hearth, face higher risks of respiratory illness, eye irritation, and chronic conditions. Collecting firewood also pulls hours out of each week, hours that could be spent in school, in paid work, or in rest. These are the realities that have prompted our clean cookstove programme in communities near our farms.

Our approach is practical and community-led. We partner with local organisations to design, build, and distribute efficient cookstoves that burn less fuel, produce less smoke, and suit the cooking habits of each household. The work is part of our wider pledge to healthy food choices, environmental protection, and ethical business practices across every region we serve.

The hidden burden of open-fire cooking

Cooking with wood or charcoal on an open fire is more than a cultural tradition. It is a significant source of indoor air pollution, releasing fine particulate matter and carbon monoxide into enclosed spaces. Health surveys in the villages near our farms often show respiratory symptoms among women and children at rates well above national averages.

The fuel-gathering burden is just as heavy. In many communities, women and older children walk several kilometres each day to collect firewood, sometimes spending three or four hours on the task. This labour takes time away from school and paid work, and it drives deforestation around the villages as nearby woodlots are stripped faster than they can regrow. The pattern is familiar to anyone who understands the pressures on remote areas, from the Atherton Tablelands in North Queensland to highland communities elsewhere.

For us, the issue is not abstract. Our employees live in these villages. Their children attend the same schools. When a household spends hours gathering fuel or a family member misses work due to a respiratory infection, the ripple effects reach our farms as well.

How cleaner cooking improves daily life

A clean cookstove is a simple, robust piece of equipment designed to burn fuel more completely and vent smoke outside the home. Many of the models we support cut fuel use by half or more while reducing indoor smoke by up to eighty per cent. The result is a kitchen that is safer to breathe in, a meal that takes less time to prepare, and a household budget that stretches further.

The change is felt within weeks. Mothers report less coughing and fewer headaches. Children sleep better and miss fewer school days. With fuel costs or collection time falling, families can redirect modest savings toward food, school fees, or small business ideas. It is a quiet transformation that compounds over years.

Saving time and opening doors

Time is the most valuable resource a household can recover. When a family no longer needs to walk hours for firewood, that time returns to them. Some women use it to tend a vegetable garden or run a small shop from home. Older siblings can stay in class instead of helping to gather fuel. In several communities, school attendance among teenage girls has climbed noticeably since cookstoves were installed.

This aligns with a principle we hold dear: a fair go for everyone. Australians often speak about giving people the chance to get ahead, and the same idea applies here. Removing a chore that eats up the afternoon is a small change with large downstream effects on education, income, and gender equality.

Building local skills through local manufacturing

The clean cookstoves are not shipped in from abroad. We work with local metalworkers, masons, and artisans to design and build units suited to local cooking styles and fuel types. This creates jobs, keeps money circulating in the community, and ensures repairs and parts are available close to home.

We also train local technicians to install, maintain, and repair the stoves. A cookstove is only useful if it works, and a local repair network keeps the programme running smoothly for years. Training sessions are held in the local language and include both men and women, with a focus on building confidence and technical skill.

Listening first, acting second

No programme succeeds without listening. Before we distribute a single stove, we spend time in the village talking with families, local leaders, women's groups, and health workers. We ask about cooking habits, fuel preferences, meal traditions, and daily routines. The feedback shapes the cookstove design, the training materials, and the rollout schedule.

Women are central to these conversations. In most households, they are the primary cooks and the main beneficiaries of cleaner air and saved time. Their input determines whether a stove sits unused in the corner or becomes a valued part of daily life. Just as a good farmer reads the land before planting, we listen before we act.

Connecting to our broader sustainability goals

The clean cookstove programme ties directly into our wider environmental commitments. Less wood burned means less pressure on nearby forests, which supports biodiversity and protects watersheds that our farms rely on. Lower fuel use also reduces carbon dioxide and black carbon emissions, contributing to our climate targets. These outcomes are tracked alongside our tree-planting, sustainable sourcing, and protected-land monitoring work.

The initiative also reinforces our commitment to ethical business practices. A supply chain is only as strong as the communities behind it. For Australian consumers who shop at Coles and Woolworths and expect their produce to be grown responsibly, these connections matter. They show that a banana or a pineapple carries more than fruit; it carries a story of care from soil to shelf.

Tracking progress and planning the next phase

We hold ourselves to clear measures. Each household that receives a stove is logged in a registry, and follow-up surveys track fuel consumption, cooking time, health symptoms, and satisfaction at six months and again at one year. We compare villages that have received stoves with those still on the waiting list to confirm the impact is real and lasting.

Early results are encouraging. Fuel use has dropped by more than half in participating homes. Reports of eye irritation and persistent coughs have fallen sharply. Women tell us they feel safer cooking with children nearby. Building on this, we are expanding the programme to additional communities near our plantations, with a target of reaching several thousand more households by the end of the next growing cycle. Readers can follow our progress on Fresh Del Monte Produce as we publish updated metrics each quarter.

Practical lessons for community stove programmes

Based on what we have learned so far, several principles stand out for any organisation considering a clean cookstove initiative:

• Design stoves around local cooking habits, not the other way around
• Train local technicians so the programme survives after external staff leave
• Measure outcomes at the household level, not just units distributed
• Engage women as co-designers from the first conversation
• Pair stove distribution with fuel-efficient cooking demonstrations
• Build in a maintenance plan and spare parts supply from day one

We are now finalising the village list for the next rollout. Our community teams will visit candidate sites in the coming weeks to confirm interest, map fuel sources, and schedule installation training. The first batch of the new cohort is expected to receive their stoves before the end of the next quarter.