Back to contents

ENERGIA News Issue 2.3, August 1998

Resources: Focus on Training

Training on Energy Saving for Female Entrepreneurs

A more efficient use of energy contributes to reducing environmental degradation. While the greatest energy consumers are large-scale industries, especially in the North, small enterprises in the South also contribute to a depletion of natural resources. In many cases, they could reduce their energy-consumption through efficiency improvement. This would not only benefit the environment, but in most cases it also directly benefits the entrepreneurs themselves.

With the possibility of such a “win-win” scenario in mind, TOOLConsult (a Dutch development organisation) has designed a 1 week training course for small scale entrepreneurs on “Efficiency Improvements and Waste Reduction”. Typically, such training courses reach male entrepreneurs more easily than female entrepreneurs - due to a number of factors including the choice of the industrial sector that the training focuses on, the choice of the counterpart organisation, the higher representation of male entrepreneurs in entrepreneurial associations, ways of advertising the course, etc. To compensate this effect, TOOLConsult linked up with AWAKE, an organisation based in Bangalore, India, run by female entrepreneurs to provide support for other female entrepreneurs, to organise a training for women entrepreneurs only. Twelve entrepreneurs participated in the training which was financed by the Dutch Department for Development. To illustrate the training, we give the experience of one of the participants, Mrs. Samati (assumed name).

Mrs Samati owns a “Cold Space” enterprise. She rents out space in a cold room to other entrepreneurs who want to keep their products, such as flowers and vegetables, fresh before shipment to local or export markets. The cold room runs on electricity.

During the training, Mrs. Samati was shown how to do a basic “energy audit” in her own business. An energy audit includes the following steps:

• identifying the different activities that make up the business
• assessing the energy use in each activity
• making a basic calculation of total energy use, the sources of greatest energy use, and the opportunities for the reduction of energy use.

From this energy audit, Mrs. Samati found that her electricity bills were one of the major costs in the business and ranged from 12,000 Rupees to 14,000 Rupees (400-500 US$) per month. Thus, for her business energy saving measures could be quite useful.

The next step was to look for possibilities to reduce the energy consumption for the cold storage. Mrs. Samati was shown how to perform a systematic visual check of her whole business, looking especially for a number of common energy-wastage points such as leaks, spillage or bad insulation. As part of the training, one of the trainers visited her SME and did a one hour energy check with her. Two quickly identified possibilities were: to insulate uncovered areas and to reduce ‘cold losses’ through the doors. These changes were implemented immediately after the training. Three months later, the trainees and trainers met again to assess the effects of the training and of the implemented changes. Mrs. Samati announced that in this period, her energy bill had been reduced to 6,600 Rupees per month (a reduction of about 50 %) as a result of the implemented improvements.

These initial savings have given Mrs. Samati the opportunity to look into investing in further efficiency improvements. At the moment the whole cold storage is kept cool, even when the room is only partially filled with produce. Therefore, one good opportunity is to divide the cold storage into several smaller units, in order to reduce the volume that needs to be cooled in the less busy times of the year.

Not all trainees had results which were as spectacular, since these depend on the kind of business. Only if energy costs make up a high share of the total business costs in the first place, can great savings be achieved by reducing such energy costs. If they make up only a small proportion, naturally the maximum gains to be made are small as well. Furthermore, if the basics of energy saving (which include insulating pipes, avoiding leakage through openings, using efficient stoves, and good housekeeping practices such as turning off switches and machines when not needed) have already been taken care of, further energy saving requires some investment, resulting in longer pay-back times. Nonetheless, all participants of the AWAKE/ TOOLConsult training had been able to make some savings through efficiency improvements. An important factor in this was the individual energy check and advice which was given for each business, and the assessment and feedback after three months. Thus, stimulated by such a personalised training, female entrepreneurs can benefit from energy efficiency, leading both to a healthier business, and to a more environmentally friendly energy consumption pattern. Efforts should be done to make such training available to women who run small to medium scale enterprises. Until the barriers that limit women's access to general training courses have disappeared, courses that target women exclusively can fulfil an important role.--

For more information, please contact:
AWAKE, B-76, Kssidic Industrial Estate, Bangalore 560044, India; Tel. +91.80.3385874, Fax +91.80.3389964 or TOOLConsult, Sarphatistraat 650, 1018 AV Amsterdam, The Netherlands; Tel. +31.20.6264409, Fax +31.20.4211202, Email toolconsult@tool.nl