Stoves are good in the fact that you drasticaly reduce the chances of forest fire. A small stove to heat up a meal and boil water can cool down while eating. With a fire you have to put it out, be sure it's out, and hope you didn't miss that tiny coal. And lets not forget sparks. Don't get me wrong I prefer an open fire for cooking and gazing into, but we have perpetual droughts and I've seen far too many foredt fires here. So a small Tommy cooker do's what I need it to, and in relative safety.