Programme to deliver cleaned energy launched (12/03/09)

Story: Leticia Ohene-Asiedu & Jennifer Dornoo
The Minister of Energy, Dr Oteng Adjei, has stated that access to financing, and the right policy framework are the most important factors hindering the successful deployment of clean energy technologies in domestic and commercial facilities in Ghana.
He explained that most micro-enterprises and households in rural and peri-urban areas in Ghana found it difficult paying upfront for clean energy technologies.
He indicated that banks and other commercial lenders, on the other hand, had limited experience with clean energy equipment financing and were therefore cautious in providing loans to these sectors.
He said this in an address read on his behalf by the Director of Administration, of the Ministry of Energy, Mr Kwame H. Adorbor, at the launch of the “Energy Equipment End-User Finance Programme” in Accra on Tuesday.
Dr Adjei said these challenges motivated the Modern Energy Equipment End-User Finance Programme which seeks to expand delivery of modern clean energy services to rural and poor households, communities and enterprises with particular focus on productive applications.
He said working with micro-finance institutions and other forward-thinking financial institutions, the programme would finance energy equipment such as solar lightning, solar water heating, biogas and the Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) systems and equipment, adding that, this was in line with the government’s programme to enhance access to modern energy services especially to the peri-urban areas of Ghana.
He assured Ghanaians of his commitment to the private sector in ensuring the performance of their role effectively.
Dr Adjei commended the United Nations Empowerment Programme (UNEP) and its national partners, Agricultural Development Bank (ADB) and the Kumasi Institute of Technology Energy and Environment (KITE) for their initiative and pledged his support to their course.
The programme which was designed to mobilise MFIs and retail units of banks to provide finance to energy end-users for energy equipment is a follow up of the African Rural Energy Enterprise Development (AREED) Program which has been in operation since 2001 to increase the delivery of clean energy services to the rural poor in five West and East African countries by supporting the development and the growth of rural energy service enterprises.
The Managing Director (MD), of KITE Mrs Harriette Amissah-Arthur said the programme would initially be piloted in Accra and Kumasi since the proposed pilot areas were deemed vital to provide the required leverage for gradual upscaling of the end-users’s financing project into rural and peri-urban areas.
She said a plan would be developed to extend and market the program to rural areas as the delivery capacities were developed to expand financing for energy equipment that served productive micro-enterprise.
The Energy Programme Officer of the Energy and Ozone Action Branch of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), Mr Lawrence Agbemabiese said, “Ghana and Africa faces huge energy challenges that threaten to reduce or even erode prospects for development, even as most of the communities become increasingly vulnerable to climate change”.
He said the launch of the Energy Equipment End-User Finance Programme provided opportunities for the eradication of energy poverty in the country.
“Translating this optimism into real results will require a regulatory or the policy framework that attracts commercial investment into the rural and peri-urban energy markets,” he added.
Mr Agbemabiese said UNEP was trying to help create a climate for change within the finance community as part of a larger package that included climate mitigation and adaptation actions.
“We look forward to working with KITE, ADB, the government of Ghana, other UN agencies and the international development organisations to help lift Ghana out of energy poverty, and put her on the road to sustainable energy for sustainable development and adaptation to climate change”, he added.