Focal area: Womens economic empowerment
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Keeping the Lights On: ENERGIA and Solar Sister’s successful partnership leverages women’s power to tackle energy poverty
By Melissa Ruggles* 2,371 women entrepreneurs recruited, trained and mentored, leading to 772,925 people with access to cleaner energy. These figures show how ENERGIA and Solar Sister have been transforming clean energy access for people in Uganda, Nigeria and Tanzania since becoming partners in September 2014. For four years now, Solar Sister has been a…
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Seizing on solar and women power in India
By Peyton Fleming/SEforALL Ajaita Shah talks at laser-fast clip, eager to get to her next thought. Her Indian solar company, Frontier Markets (FM), is moving even faster, eager to capitalize on one of the most untapped and challenging markets in the world. With solar costs plummeting and solar startups popping up everywhere, Shah’s six-year-old enterprise…
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Energizing equality: The importance of integrating gender equality principles in national energy policies and frameworks
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Cultivating women’s inner strength and capacities for entrepreneurship
Dr. Anita Shankar discusses agency building, ENERGIA’s work, and how women are empowered from the inside out. When you hear the word ‘agency’, the first thing that may come to mind is a physical entity, a building with people working away in an office, a travel agency, a recruitment agency, a government department, and so…
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ECOWAS directive on gender assessments in energy projects
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Exploring energy issues for women entrepreneurs in guatemala
A small team of Hivos team members and representatives from our host partner in Guatemala, Alterna Impact, went on a learning adventure on July 28 to meet with Guatemalan women entrepreneurs and learn about their needs and experiences around renewable energy. In the team were Raquel Chacón and Kattia Quirós from Hivos’ Costa Rica office…
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Innovative public outreach in Indonesia
By Neva Nahtigal Kopernik, our partner in Indonesia, has been working to improve public understanding of issues related to women and energy access. At the core of their recent activities in pursuit of that goal is the Indonesian Women for Energy – or #IDWOMEN4ENERGY – campaign. As Kopernik’s communications officer Ina Saptiono explained, “This…
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PRESS RELEASE: Women need a seat at the clean energy table
Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania – On August 24, 2017, Solar Sister, in collaboration with the UN Foundation-led Energy Access Practitioner Network and ENERGIA will host a workshop to highlight the need for more meaningful inclusion of women in clean energy access value chains and policies. Solar Sister will also launch new research from the Miller Center for Social Entrepreneurship on the benefits of its…
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Famous singer lending her voice to the cause of expanding energy access and women’s opportunities
“We get a lot more media attention when our celebrity ambassadors take action, and we believe that having celebrities carry our message has enabled us to reach out to a wider segment of the population,” said Laura Nolan, Communications officer at Energy 4 Impact in Senegal. The most prominent celebrity that Energy 4 Impact has…
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A cookstoves producer who never gives up
Daw Htay Htay, the owner of a cookstove production unit in the Pathein region of Myanmar, is finally more relaxed and contented. But life has been far from easy for this 57-year-old woman. She was her parents’ only child, and her mother died when Daw Htay Htay was very young. Her father, a ship docker,…
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Five outstanding women entrepreneurs from Myanmar
A group of remarkable women from Chaung U, Myanmar, redefined adversity as just an inconvenience, with opportunities lurking around the corner. In the process of developing their successful cookstoves businesses, they became role models for other women and demonstrated that perseverance is key for a happy ending. A 25-year-old has an idea Chaung U…
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Breaking down barriers in clean energy entrepreneurs’ access to finance
Financing is a big challenge in expanding energy access to the last mile, and women entrepreneurs face even larger bottlenecks than men when engaging in this field. A lot of the difficulties are related to non-financial barriers. These include, among others, the legal and regulatory environment, education and awareness among women, and constraints within financial…