African bank strikes deal with cleaner cookstoves company

One of Africa’s largest banks has signed an agreement with a cleaner cooking project developer focused in Kenya.

The RMB bank, a division of the FirstRand group, announced a new partnership with Koko Networks, a clean cookstoves company, to develop carbon projects further on the continent.

“As a pan-African investment bank, this deal fits well within our ambition to build a market-leading carbon trading and finance business operating across Africa, serving both existing and new clients,” said Phil Norton, carbon finance lead at RMB

The agreement means that Koko will now have access to financing provided by RMB for its projects, said the company in a statement.

Koko develops carbon projects related to cleaner cooking in Kenya. It supplies 1.1 million homes with bioethanol cooking fuel sold at “fuel ATMs” available nationwide.

The “resultant carbon revenues are shared with households as a non-government energy subsidy, enabling even the poorest households to switch,” the company said.

The new deal marks another partnership between RMB and companies focused on climate change mitigation.

RMB had already announced a deal with pan-African company Africa Climate Ventures (ACV), which is Koko’s partner in the joint venture, last September to invest in companies focused on “climate-positive technologies”.

ACV is a "venture builder" and aims to offset 1 million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent a year by 2030.