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Relationship between digital literacy and clean energy transition in rural cooking unveiled by IARRP researchers

IARRP | Updated: 2025-01-13

The Innovation Team of Agricultural Allocation and Regional Development at the Institute of Agricultural Resources and Regional Planning (IARRP) of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences (CAAS) have made significant progress in their research on the transition of energy sources for rural cooking. Their research findings, titled "Digital literacy and the rural cooking energy transition: Evidence from rural China," have been published in the top-tier economics journal "Energy Policy" (IF=9.3 for 2023-2024) indexed in both SSCI and SCI in the JCR.

Ensuring universal access to affordable, reliable, and sustainable modern energy and driving the global energy system transformation are crucial components of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 7. According to the World Health Organization, approximately 2.4 billion people globally still rely on non-clean energy sources. Data from the International Energy Agency shows that in 2022, over 183 million Chinese residents were unable to access clean cooking fuel, a number surpassing regions like North Africa, Indonesia, Latin America, and the Middle East. In recent years,  the rapid development of information and communication technology is leading to significant improvements in economic and social performance, rural residents' digital literacy has also seen a significant improvement. However, the relationship between digital literacy and the transition of rural cooking energy needs further clarification.

This study, based on data from the China Family Panel Studies (CFPS), quantitatively examines the impact of digital literacy on the clean-up of household cooking fuels and its mechanisms, analyzing the heterogeneous effects under different regions, age, gender, and health conditions. The research reveals that improvements in digital literacy significantly promote households' choice of clean cooking fuels. The promotion effect of digital literacy on young and middle-aged rural households in eastern and western regions choosing clean cooking fuels is particularly pronounced. Digital literacy can facilitate the use of clean cooking fuels by households using two pathways: expanding information channels and enhancing non-agricultural employment. The study's conclusions are instrumental in adjusting strategies to enhance digital literacy effectively, promoting the transition to clean cooking energy sources in rural areas. This provides strategic references for advancing China's goals of "peak carbon emissions" and "carbon neutrality," as well as achieving the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 7 (SDG7).

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Lu Hongwei, a doctoral student at the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences' Institute of Agricultural Resources and Regional Planning, is the first author of the paper, with Researcher Luo Qiyou and Associate Researcher Gao Mingjie as the corresponding authors. This research received joint funding from projects such as the National Key Laboratory for Efficient Utilization of Northern Arid and Semi-Arid Cropland, the National Potato Industry Technology System, and major scientific and technological tasks of the Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences.

Article Link: 

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2024.114451