Lighting Ethiopia

completed

The WBG through the Lighting Africa Program in Ethiopia aims to increase access to better, cleaner and safer off-grid lighting to the rural populations not connected to the grid. The program will accelerate the development of the markets for modern, quality off-grid lighting products targeting the rural population who currently use kerosene and dry cell batteries as their main sources of lighting. The program will accomplish this by undertaking a number of market development activities: -Market Intelligence: to help product marketers and distributors understand the new off-grid lighting market segment, supply and distribution chains. The insights from the research will serve to inform their business and strategic plans. -Quality Assurance: promoting the adoption of Lighting Global quality standards across the sector to counter the risk of market spoilage from the infiltration of low quality products that erodes confidence in the new off-grid technologies among consumers, financiers and stakeholders. -Access to finance: adequate financing along the entire supply chain has been identified as being critical for the growth of the off-grid lighting market. The program will develop financing facilities through financial institutions to meet the demand from the market. -Consumer Education: to create awareness, for a market to grow and thrive, consumers must know what products are available and understand the value and benefits of these products over what they are currently using (kerosene and candles). Consumers must also be able to distinguish between good and poor quality products in order to get good value for their scarce resources. -Business Development Support: provide a range of market and business development support activities directly to manufacturers, distributors and retailers with the objective of fostering competition and creating a vibrant and competitive market that will extend distribution to the rural areas.