Nuru Energy is trying to put technology into the hands of those who need it most, writes JODY CLARKE
IN RUKINAD village’s telephone repair store, an hour south of Kigali, Juvenal Kamana is pedalling himself an income.
Coining 20,000-25,000RFR (€26-€32.50) in profit every month, he’s no Rumpelstiltskin. But added to the money he makes fixing mobile phones, he is a veritable industrialist in an area best known for subsistence farming and sorghum.
“I’ve got eight children, so the money helps in sending them to school” says Kamana, who spends 1,000RFR every term for each child. “I’ve just got 145 customers so far, but I’m working hard on getting more.”
Kamana has just stepped off the power cycle, a 1ft-high (30cm) 1ft-wide generator that looks not all that different from a crudely made exercise bike.
Manufactured by a breakaway outfit of Freeplay Energy, the company that made hand crank radios, the user pedals a small generator that charges five Led lights every 20 minutes.
Started in 2009 with $200,000 (€154,000) in seed money from the World Bank Lighting Africa initiative, Nuru Energy aims to get technology into the hands of those who need it most and sidestep international donors, who can hold up funding, thereby slowing down the process of getting projects off the ground. Instead, local entrepreneurs in countries such as Rwanda start the businesses with funding arranged through microfinance loans.
Nuru arranges micro-loans for people who want to buy one of the Led lights that the generator powers. They cost 3,750RFR each, 12 times the daily income of average Rwandans.
Meanwhile, entrepreneurs like Kamana pay $200 for the bike, which is paid for a by a loan also arranged through Nuru.
“Only 5 per cent of the population have access to electricity and just 2 per cent of people in rural areas, so there is a real need which people meet themselves,” says Sloan Holzman, one of Nuru’s Rwandan-based directors.
“Rwanda also has a very high population density, which makes it easier for a dealer to sell the lights as his customers don’t have to walk 10km to get to him.”
Based on the company’s research, every 600 minutes of light equals one minute of pedalling, with each light lasting 40 hours.
That might not sound revolutionary. But in a country where people spend about 33 per cent of their incomes on fossil fuel just to light their homes, it could ease the burden for many.
With only 18 per cent of the population connected to the electricity grid, Rwandans on average spend $55 a year on kerosene. The total cost of the light bulb and the charge, which is 150RFR (0.25 US cents), amounts to about $19 a year. A big saving.
It is also safer than kerosene, which gives off dangerous fumes and has caused many house fires in the country.
Sales started in March, and the company is hoping to sell 1,000 lights by the end of July.
The business environment has also helped Nuru, the company says. Rwanda has negligible corruption, according to watchdog Transparency International, while a business permit takes just two days to obtain. It can take several months in neighbouring countries.
“This is a very stable country” says Holzman. “You don’t have to pay bribes to get your company off the ground and things operate very effectively.”
The lights are made in China, and Nuru hopes to start operating in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania soon. It is also looking to target India, where 50 per cent of the population has no access to electricity.
About two billion people in the world have no access to mains electricity, so there could be a ready market for the company’s product elsewhere.
For the time being though, it is having a small but significant impact on people in Rwanda.
“I don’t grow rice or potatoes on my farm” says Annonciata Mukandekwe, another investor in Nuru’s generator.
“But with the money I make from charging the light bulbs, I can buy these and onions as well for me and my three children. I’m not going to be rich, but it is making a real difference to my life.”
