This Saturday, films of our winners are being shown across the world. The Rural Energy Foundation and the partnership between the Vietnamese Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD) and SNV will have their stories shared in Cancún. Their films will form part of a festival put on by the International Institute for the Environment and Development (IIED) as part of their Development and Climate Days side event. To be screened in the morning slot, they will form part of the five shorts presented under the theme 'Techonology and Adaptation: shifting towards sustainable energy production'.
On the other side of the globe in Japan, SELCO will feature in a programme analysing India's fast developing economy. To be broadcast nationally, the half-hour programme, 'Dynamic India', includes an interview with SELCO's founder Harish Hande. Harish is asked to shed light, from a social enterprise perspective, on the key to India's growth. The programme will be streamed live from NHK's website homepage and can be watched at 2:10, 6:10, 10:10, 3:10, 17:10 and 22:10 UTC (equivalent to GMT ).
(pic: Harish Hande, Founder of SELCO on 'Dynamic India' courtesy of NHK)
Friday, 3 December 2010
Our winners broadcast globally over the weekend
Tuesday, 23 November 2010
Ashden winners go to INSEAD for advice on how to scale up
Last week, as part of the Ashden Business Support Programme, three of our past winners attended the world-class INSEAD Business School, on the outskirts of Paris, to help them scale up their renewable energy projects. The week-long INSEAD Social Entrepreneurship Programme has been designed specially for those trying to balance social and financial sustainability. For each of our winners, the week came at a critical moment in their business transformation. Each left with valuable insights for the road ahead.
Mariana, our International Programme Manager also attended. When Mariana got back to the office yesterday she reported on the winners' progress:
“Sky Link Innovators is facing a point of major decision: it now has to choose which biogas products to focus on and how to grow. Samwel (director) says he has left the course with a much clearer sense of the value of strategic partnerships and he is also thinking about how to manage his technicians to be as effective as possible.”
“StoveTec, the commercial spin off from Aprovecho Research Center, is at a stage where it wants to massively scale up its sale of clean cookstoves over the next three years. Ben (director) has returned to work with a much clearer understanding of what models they can use to do this.”
“Lastly, Willem (director) from Rural Energy Foundation, has gained an understanding of how he might manage his staff more effectively as REF faces a turning point, as it moves from a foundation to a more financially sustainable social enterprise.”
“All of our winners left with a massive boost in energy and inspiration, overall it was the interaction and support from other social entrepreneurs facing similar challenges that they valued as well as hearing detailed case studies about how other amazing projects have managed to achieve scale”.
(pic: Mariana, Willem, Samwel and Ben at the INSEAD Social Entrepreneurship Programme)
Friday, 12 November 2010
Chris addresses delegates from 12 sub-Saharan countries on solar and stoves
He was guest speaker at a joint international workshop in Uganda on the shores of Lake Victoria, organised by the Baring and John Ellerman Foundations.
This was a valuable opportunity for Chris to show the effectiveness of solar and stove equipment to delegates from Mauritania, Ghana, Chad, Zimbabwe, Sudan, Ethiopia, Tanzania, Democratic Republic of Congo, Kenya and, of course, Uganda.
The purpose of the week had been to share experiences of working with displaced peoples and focus on women, rights and education. Chris wrote to us:
I am mainly going to talk about two challenges - indoor air pollution and lack of access to electricity. I will then share with the delegates some of the technologies available to deal with these challenges (efficient cook stoves and solar energy), the benefits gained from using these technologies (better health, income generation and saving and environmental conservation) and I will share with them the approach that Rural Energy Foundation has taken to diffuse these technologies (market development).
The Rural Energy Foundation won the 2010 Ashden Award for Africa, which was supported by the John Ellerman Foundation.
Update - Chris comments on the response: "A lot of interest was shown by the delegates. It was really eye opening for them, especially the statistics on the deaths caused by smoke and indoor pollution and the lack of access to electricity in Africa. They were also surprised about some of the new technologies which are more affordable like the D.light Kiran and the Barefoot Power Firefly...I've even received an invitation from one of the organizations that attended to talk about the same subject".
