European energy firm seeks to boost rural areas
Europe’s energy firm Shneider Electric says it seeks to venture into Malawi’s rural market as part of its social corporate responsibility programme that will create 10 000 African jobs.
As part of the complex initiative, Shneider Electric says it is partnering with impoverished African and Asian communities to market several simple energy solutions at relatively fair prices to the communities.
The energy giant says the plan is to stimulate access to energy among the impoverished societies while creating business opportunities and jobs with some 10 000 jobs reserved for Africa.
The company will also train some Africans in maintenance, repairing and connections of energy-related equipment plus provide tutorials in business management.
Speaking in Lilongwe ahead of meeting government and private sectors officials in Lilongwe, the company’s representatives said the initiative was particularly important to countries such as Malawi who are currently facing huge energy deficits.
“We are concerned as a leading energy company that 1.3 billion people around the world have no access to energy. This is part of our SCR initiative as the main objective is to ensure access to electricity by the poor other than make profit, if were to sell these solutions on a business model, they would cost almost 50 percent more but were are happy to sell the solutions at a cost to the company,” said head of sustainable development Zanelle Dalglish.
Tawanda Madovi, managing director for International Power Control Systems (IPCS), a corporate company of Shneider Electric said he was optimistic that the talks with local companies and authorities would be fruitful.
He revealed that the company was also engaged in talks with a local microfinance company to facilitate rural communities’ access to the solutions.
“In Malawi, despite recent improvements in the electricity supply such as upgrading of Kapichira and the rural electrification programme, only six percent of the population has access to electricity so we need to bring in more solutions to bring energy to Malawians at an affordable rate,” added Madovi.
