An excursion that two CEDESOL volunteers and one employee took last week demonstrates the inextricable link between the goals of combating poverty and protecting the environment. With the help of Niños con Valor, an organization that aims to improve the quality of life for neglected children in Bolivian, CEDESOL delivered solar stoves to nine nurseries close to the rural community of Mizque in the department of Cochabamba.

These nurseries—wawasis Quechua, the region’s native language—suffer from a chronic lack of funds, and often find themselves without the necessary resources to cook for the enrolled children. With these solar cookers, the nurseries can save funds that otherwise would have been spent on gas, wood, and other types of fuel. Instead, they will be able to trust the sun’s rays, a free and renewable source of energy, to cook for their children.

On Thursday, August 4, around 50 representatives from the wawasis in the area congregated in Mizque for a day of education, food, and fun. The representatives of CEDESOL and Niños con Valor led a solar cooking training session. One goal of the demonstration was to explain how to use the solar stoves so the representatives of the wawasis could come away with the knowledge of how the stoves work. But we also shared a banquet with the representatives; we cooked mustard chicken, quinua with potatoes, lentil with onion and carrots, pastas, and cakes.

It was a day filled with delicious food, education about solar cookers, and hope for the rural nurseries that do crucial work but suffer from a lack of money. In addition to being the most environmentally efficient method of cooking, solar stoves represent the most economical option for the disenfranchised people of the Bolivian countryside—and their wawas as well.