Corporate-Led Sustainable Development and Energy Poverty Alleviation at the Bottom of the Pyramid: The Case of the CleanCook in Nigeria

Corporations are increasingly viewed as key actors in poverty alleviation. “Bottom of the Pyramid” (BoP) advocates suggest that MultiNational Corporations (MNCs) can simultaneously alleviate poverty and make profits by selling scaled-down products to the poor. Our paper investigates this claim using the case of the CleanCook stove-and-fuel technology introduced in Nigeria by an MNC working through a nonprofit organization and local business actors. Supply and demand-side analyses show that the CleanCook is least likely to reach the energy-poor BoP households originally targeted. The evidence suggests that serving the BoP requires greater differentiation than can be achieved with profit-driven business models.