First Incentives from Stove Auction in Vietnam Awarded

Hanoi, February 15 – Green Generation Joint Stock Company (GreenGen) was rewarded with the first incentives under the “Stove Auction” - an innovative approach that SNV employs as part of the global Energising Development (EnDev) programme to spur advanced clean cookstove producers in the Mekong region through a result-based finance (RBF) scheme. This marks an important milestone for the programme that aims to install around 46,000 advanced stoves in Vietnam by 2019.

"We are excited to be participating in this initiative. Once our cookstove sales have been verified by the Vietnam Women’s Union, we receive the money from the project and we have the freedom to use it in a way we think is most appropriate for our company. Now we will use all the money to reinvest in marketing and boosting up our sales network”, said Nguyen Tuan Anh, Chief Executive Officer, GreenGen.

The “Stove Auction” is part of the SNV-managed Advanced Clean Cooking Solutions (ACCS) programme implemented under the global multi-donor EnDev partnership. It aims to accelerate the market for advanced biomass stoves in Cambodia, Lao PDR, and Vietnam. In Vietnam, producers are invited once a week to bid for incentive levels at the auction where the lowest bidder wins the whole batch.

“The auction model is an innovative way of going about market development and if successfully implemented, may open new avenues  to make aid meaningful and effective. We are excited to be the first to do so with our partners. This programme not only focusses on increasing access to advanced clean cookstoves, but through the quality standards on efficiency, emissions and safety, our team has introduced many relevant design improvements to the stove producers that benefit the users”, said Bastiaan Teune, Energy Sector Leader at SNV Vietnam.

To be certified stoves need to meet international standards and criteria set by the programme. The stoves are brought to a laboratory in Lao PDR for a final independent test report before becoming eligible for the programme. Through a cloud based survey system called AKVO, the sales of the cookstoves are verified with GPS coordinates and digital questionnaires. The Vietnam Women’s Union provides these services through telephone calls and on-site inspection of stoves in the end-users' kitchens.

The Stove Auction is part of a large facility of EnDev with the special purpose to pilot RBF for low-carbon energy access. A total of 17 RBF projects in 14 countries are currently implemented. The portfolio is characterised by a balanced spread of implementers, RBF approaches, technologies and geographic outreach in Africa, Asia and Latin America. Find out more information here.