For 29-year-old Lucia Cabral, evenings could only mean retreating into a cloud of thick smoke and darkness. In Uma Naruc, a remote village in Manatuto municipality, six family members share a home with a monthly income between $150 and $200. 

Lucia's days revolve around subsistence farming and household management; she always juggles caring for her four sons while maintaining the rhythms of rural life in the sub-village of Bua. But without reliable light post sunset, her ability to work—to help her children, to cook a nourishing meal, to navigate in her own home—tapers drastically. The kerosene lamps offered only dim, expensive relief. Batteries often drained quickly. While candles carry enough light to help her complete her duties. Each month, the financial strain of temporary lighting solutions takes precedence over other priorities: rice, vegetables, and school supplies.

Meanwhile, her kitchen told another tale of hardship. The traditional three-stone cooking method demanded constant wood collection and produced engulfing smoke that filled the cooking space. While Lucia coughed through meal preparation, her sons' eyes reddened from the fumes. The very act of nourishing her family meant exposing them to harmful smoke, day after day.

"I couldn't spend time with my children, couldn't help them with homework," Lucia recalls. "I worried about their learning, about their future. And in the kitchen, I worried about their lungs, their health."

Then, early 2025 introduced a new way of life as her family became one of the 1000 households to receive a solar panel kit and an improved cooking stove under UNDP’s Pacific Green Transformation Project, funded by the Government of Japan. 

The solar kit comprised four lanterns, a panel, cables, a charger, and a remote controller. While the new stove required only two pieces of dry wood to burn effectively with minimal smoke, a fraction of the fuel the traditional la’lian consumed.

"Everything shifted," Lucia notes with a sigh of relief. "I can cook properly now without smoke choking us. I can see what I'm doing at night. I can sew my children's clothes without straining my eyes. I can move through my house without fear."

For the first time, her sons could study after sunset under reliable light while breathing cleaner air. The kitchen transformed from a hazardous necessity into simply a place where meals are prepared. Simultaneously, the improved stove freed Lucia from hours of wood collection, and the portable solar lanterns allowed her to carry light outside at night. 

"I feel safer now, in every way," she explains. "Safe moving around at night, safe knowing my children aren't breathing harmful smoke."

Lucia’s story not only weaves a vision of a new future, but it also envelopes stories of immediate ease. Money that was previously spent on kerosene, batteries, candles, and excessive firewood is now diverted to better food, necessary household materials, and savings for a brighter tomorrow. Her family contributes more meaningfully to cultural gatherings and extended family obligations—events central to life in Uma Naruc.

"Our children study better in clean air and good light. We save money. We gather as a family," Lucia reflects. "This is an opportunity for a better life."

For now, in Uma Naruc, two simple truths prevail: where there was darkness, there is now light, and where there was smoke, there is now clean air. And for Lucia Cabral and her four sons, evenings are now filled with quality time where the family helps with homework and chores, something Lucia was unable to find time for before. 

Her vision for the future extends far beyond her village as she expresses worry for countless communities in Timor-Leste who remain disconnected from electricity and clean cooking technology. The independence and dignity that light and health enable pave the way towards a sustainable collective dream.

Lucia represents stories of many women in the 1000 beneficiary households across rural Timor-Leste who received solar panel kits and improved cooking stoves. Accessible infrastructure that lends itself to a sustainable future in the face of climate change vulnerabilities offers a vital sense of security and belongingness to its communities. 

It is hard to deny the transformative power of reliable light and safer cooking systems in households. The Pacific Green Transformation Project, supported by the Government of Japan and implemented by UNDP, provides tools for a better today to create an even stronger tomorrow for Timor-Leste.