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OK, I searched a bit and found an article from 2011, which appears to be the original source (free access [1]). It appears that aluminum is the most common material from which local pots were made.

[1] http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1365-3156.2011....

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Correct, it is hard to find anything other than aluminum pots here.

In rural Asia, cast iron tends to be--relative to flimsy aluminum--too expensive, too heavy (a large percentage of those doing the cooking weigh less than 100lbs/45kg), and too poor at conducting heat and too good at absorbing it (thermal inertia), meaning that more cooking fuel is required to cook small meals in cast iron pots than in aluminum.

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