Hilaria brings creativity to challenges
22 December 2017
Published previously as a Solar Sister journey Last we spoke in June, Hilaria traveled to New York to accept ENERGIA’s Women Entrepreneur of the Year Award, sharing her wisdom and experience as a clean energy entrepreneur and receiving a EUR 1,000 prize. Since then, Hilaria has been going about business – both solar and her long-time basket-weaving enterprise. She tells us business has been good. “The benefits are still there – I have an income and this makes my husband happy too. I have three children in school now thanks to my businesses. The basket-weaving benefits from the solar business, and I’ve also been able to invest in my farm.” “And, to be honest, being a Solar Sister entrepreneur gives me respect in the community.” Hilaria deliberated how best to use her ENERGIA prize money – she wanted to make sure she put it to the most sustainable use. In the end, she decided to invest a little in her businesses and put the bulk of her cash award towards her daughters’ education. Her 18 year-old daughter Theresia is studying accounting in Singida and 15 year-old Gladness is a secondary school student. For Hilaria, a good education is paramount. “If I had studied I would have had so many opportunities. I went to primary school only. I don’t want my children to be like me.” *** Hilaria lives and works in Madukani, a village at the junction of two roads, a few miles from the border of Tarangire, one of Tanzania’s popular national parks. Reaching…
Read moreHilaria wins ENERGIA’s Women Entrepreneur of 2017 Award!
25 July 2017
Hilaria Paschal is a successful entrepreneur because she never gives up and is not afraid to try new things in her business. In 2016, she kept her Solar Sister business going in spite of caring for her sick child and dipping into her savings for the medical costs. Hilaria truly exemplifies Solar Sister’s values of grit and sisterhood! For this reason, Solar Sister nominated Hilaria for ENERGIA’s Women Entrepreneur of the Year Award. As part of receiving the award, Hilaria travelled to New York City to represent Solar Sister at the 2017 Sustainable Energy for All Forum. While there, she shared her experiences and challenges with sector leaders and innovators and was able to meet other entrepreneurs like herself from around the world. “Hilaria was one of the earliest Solar Sister entrepreneurs in Tanzania, introduced to us by our partners at African Wildlife Foundation. She is a wonderful example of a strong woman who lives Solar Sister’s values. She has not only improved her and her family’s life by being a Solar Sister, but also has been a leader to make sure that other women in her community benefit from the ripple effect of Solar Sister’s green business opportunity.” – Neha Misra, Solar Sister’s Chief Collaboration Officer Hilaria also received 1,000 EURO as part of the ENERGIA award in recognition of her leadership and dedication to empowering women in her community. Hilaria plans to use the funds to take English lessons, add capital to her business and pay for her daughter’s school fees…
Read moreOumy wins ENERGIA Women Entrepreneurship Award
7 June 2017
Oumy Ngom is one of the proud winners of the ENERGIA Women Entrepreneurship Award, getting the chance to share her experience at the SEforALL Forum in New York, 3 – 5 April 2017, and going home with a prize of €1,000 to support her business. ENERGIA rewarded five women from Asia and Africa to recognise their outstanding work and encourage them to perform even better in the future. Oumy is one of those women who, having demonstrated her motivation and desire to develop economic activities within her community, won the opportunity to share her experience as a woman entrepreneur in Eastern Senegal at the 2017 SEforALL Forum in New York, and go home with a cash prize to support the development of her business. A sales agent of solar lanterns and improved cookstoves in the outskirts of Tambacounda, Senegal, she also runs a food processing unit operate by her women’s group. When I started selling solar lights and improved cookstoves, I didn’t realise I could also use these products to increase the production of my agricultural processing unit. The stoves are great for processing jams and others products in a timely, healthy manner. With the prize, I would now like to invest in more renewables such as solar panels to power the unit. All nominees have been actively engaged in the Women’s Economic Empowerment Programme for at least one year and have been continuously running a profitable business for at least three quarters of a year. They have all demonstrated clear and…
Read moreOumy Ngom makes energy available to her community through the sale of solar lamps and improved cookstoves
31 May 2017
Born in Tambacounda in 1971, Oumy was one of the few girls of her generation to attend secondary schooling in the region. Widowed for 17 years, she took care of the education and subsistence of her children – which made her want to support other women in difficulty like her. In 2005, Oumy became President of the CESIRI group, which aims to empower women through the processing of forest products, fruits and vegetables – all the while improving nutrition in the region. Today, CESIRI is a network of women including 47 organisations and 1,310 members active in the processing of local agricultural products such as couscous, thiakry, corn, arraw, papaya jam, concentrated syrup of bissap, ginger and fonio. The network also carries out community health activities, including awareness raising against neo-natal mortality, family planning and prevention of sexually transmitted diseases. CESIRI also provides literacy classes for its members and anyone wishing to benefit from their services. After years of hard work, Oumy is now working with the women in the network to make clean energy available people in Tambacounda, through the sale of solar lamps and improved cookstoves. I joined the group to bring change, focussing first on malnutrition in the community and then on health and education. Now I want to do something about the energy shortages that we face and change the quality of life for people throughout the region. – Oumy Ngom Hard working, she now hopes to build a fully equipped solar processing unit to avoid regular cuts that occur through the national electricity grid. Solar energy offers a reliable and cost-effective option for companies whose…
Read moreEconomic crisis in Kédougou hits hard on micro energy businesses
12 May 2017Due to the economic crisis that hit the region of Kédougou last year, Energy 4 Impact was forced to end its operations in the area. The region’s economy depends mostly on gold mining, but with one of the main mines closing in 2016, the area’s economic stability took a hit, making it a challenge for entrepreneurs to sell clean energy products to customers in their local communities. Fatoumata and the other 50 women entrepreneurs that we supported in the region could no longer sustain their businesses. Very few of them could provide the minimum required up-front capital or collaterals (25%) to enable them to get a loan or repay credit to the suppliers. Energy 4 Impact now concentrates its efforts on neighbouring Tambacounda, supporting 160 women in the sale of energy services and products, as well as productive use of energy through solar refrigeration. Click here to follow the stories of Germaine Dione and Oumy Ngom in Tambacounda.
Read moreMy dream is to build a house for my cattle.
17 February 2017Halima Mdee worked very hard in 2016 to grow her business from the ground up and was able to deliver clean energy access to 280 people in her community. Halima’s bestselling product is the d.Light S2, a small, affordable solar lantern that replaces the need for kerosene in rural households. Halima herself uses this light and saves 2,500 TZS a week in lighting costs alone. Halima started off this new year by increasing her stock of the S2 immediately. Halima hopes to earn enough money this year to build a house for her cattle to better protect them from predators. Her main strategy will be to use her bicycle from Solar Sister to find new markets and reach communities that are even farther off the grid. My dream is to build a house for my cattle. I hope that I will sell more products so I can accomplish my dream. – Halima Mdee
Read moreA complete house of our own!
30 January 2017
It was an ordinary working day back in 2014, when my husband and I had been working in the field until evening time. We were exhausted after a long day of work so were keen to head straight home afterwards. As we walked down to our house, we could see the sky turning grey and smoke filling up the air. We wondered what was causing this, but could not figure it out. But as we arrived home, we could not believe what we saw: our house was on fire! It was a huge fire and we were so shocked. Our neighbours were panicking and trying to help by pouring water over the house, but it wasn’t much help. We tried to save as many things as we could, but in the end all we could do was stand helplessly and watched our house completely burn down. For us, it was not just a house, it was a traditional house. We built it according to our traditional custom so it was very special. Until today, I still cannot understand how it happened. Did I forget to turn the stove off? Did a cat knock over a lit kerosene lamp? We will never know. So much was taken away, but we have to live with it now. After spending several months in one of our relative’s houses, we gradually started to save money to build a new house of our own. Because the cost to build a traditional house is very expensive,…
Read moreGermaine diversifies her sales thanks to a new solar fridge
12 December 2016
Germaine and her women’s group have been operating their banana processing unit for years, but were limited to selling dry and powdered products due to lack of storage. “We started this processing unit to avoid leaving crops to spoil in the sun. But without the appropriate equipment we couldn’t keep the bananas fresh and had to turn them into dry products”, says Germaine. Through a partnership between Energy 4 Impact and solar equipment provider Bonergie, they received their own solar fridge and freezer to help increase productivity and diversify sales. The group has now gone from producing and selling flour, couscous, dried fruits and banana products to fruit juices, milk and fresh water. “The arrival of the fridge, coupled with Energy 4 Impact’s business development support, helped us better understand both our sales and customers’ needs. We are now selling more and have made an increase in profit of 153 euros within the first month,” says Germaine.
Read moreImproved Cookstoves: Road to recognition and empowerment
6 December 2016
Ms. Bimala Rai, our empowerment journey candidate from Rampur, Udaypur is actively involved in the promotion of Improved Cookstoves (ICS) with her business partner, Ms. Kalpana Rai. Since our meeting, few months back, Bimala has installed about 200 ICS. “There is growing demand and together with Kalpana we can install six to seven ICS per day in areas where houses are closer. We charge five euro for each installation. To help us meet the demand in time, we have even employed five non-salaried helpers. There is still demand of at least 1,000 ICS in my working area. This is good for us”. The enthusiasm oozing from the duo is infectious. The shy lady of March 2016 is today noticeably confident. One could hardly hear her voice then, but today she is seen voicing her opinion at meetings and in conversations with her clients. Together, the ICS entrepreneur duo has extended their ICS services as active dealers of the metallic components of ICS in neighbouring villages of the district. Besides installation work, they have already sold around 850 ICS metallic components in the area through other stove masters. Ms. Bimala stated ‘We have a joint account in the cooperative; we deposit our overall income from the ICS business in this account. The money is used as an investment fund, mainly to place orders for the ICS metallic components.’ Reiterating this, the Executive Secretary of Shayogi Bachhat Tatha Reen Sahakari Sanstha Ltd, the local financial institution, who states: “We are pleasantly surprised…
Read morePoor weather conditions and waning gold industry affect Fatoumata’s solar lamp business
25 August 2016
Fatoumata has been facing challenges most of her life, but has always shown determination to overcome them. So when economic crisis hit her region a few months ago, she fought to find ways to keep her business going and continue spreading the word about the benefits of solar lighting. How has the business been going since you started your activities in spring? Things have been going quite slow. Unfortunately, nobody can predict how the economy will go and the region I live in, Kedougou, has taken quite a big hit. Weather conditions led to poor harvests for farmers over winter, and also affected the gold panning industry, one of the main sources of income in the region. Despite this, I am very happy that I still managed to make some sales! To date, I have managed to sell a third of the lamps I initially ordered and am now working on ways to sell the remaining products. What are your future plans to increase sales? I think support in marketing may well increase my sales; with support from Energy 4 Impact I would like to develop advertisements and posters with information about my location, my contact details and even my picture, so that people can recognise me! Villages are quite far from one another in this area – so this kind of promotional material will help me expand my client base. I am also considering investing in a motorcycle, so I can start delivering products to the most remote areas….
Read moreI knew that briquettes were a great idea and I could see it as a viable business
25 August 2016
“I am a mother of 2 grown up boys. I used to work in a curio and artifact shop in Nairobi. Every time I opened the shop I would wish that I had my own business. I was certain that the skills I had been exposed to would make me some money one day. The first time I decided to get in to business, I started with a meat mincer. The income I got from this would supplement my employment salary and in any case I needed to get my boys through school. I had also learnt to knit floor rags, carpets and mats. I would then seek a market to sell these wares. I stopped the meat mincing business because I could not fetch as many customers to run it effectively and continued with the rags and a poultry farming. I kept rabbits and chicken. The weather did not favour my poultry business and at one point I had a total loss – 250 chicks from Newcastle disease. I knew I needed a new less risky business. When I finally quit employment and focused on business, I found a good market for my woolen and polyester rags. I made good money from this but it was not to last. Soon, cheap imports from China and other countries began to flood the market. I found myself begin to struggle. In fact at one point I wanted to quit and seek employment but my father advised me against it. He could…
Read moreOne day I will distribute stoves on my own
24 August 2016
“When I trained as a Grade1 draper, my drive and passion was towards self-employment. I then met my husband Samuel Kariuki, then a saw miller in the village, and our union was blessed with two boys. I soon realised that my tailoring would not yield the satisfaction I was looking for. At the same time, felt that I went on to tea picking like everybody else did and delivering my produce to the Chinga Tea Factory. Soon I found that I easily built relationships with the management of the tea factory allowing me to volunteer in many of the social activities organized. When Farmer Field Schools were held in my village, I attended them enthusiastically. Here I learnt skills like crop production and tending to tea, keeping livestock and so on. But it was the introduction to the energy efficient stoves as a business that really changed my view of work. WEEK Project staff taught me how to install energy efficient stoves in homes in the region. I got conversant with the types of stoves I could install and even sell to the residents in my locality. The tea factory imposed a rebate to each of its clients who had installed the energy efficient stoves and components of its environment programme thus encouraging members to request for the products. This created an opportunity for us as promoters of the initiative and our commissions made good business sense for me. I envision that one day I will be able to distribute…
Read more1 August 2016
“A Technology fair or ‘Tech Fair’ is a showcase event to introduce the technologies to community members. During the tech fair, people are able to test and try out the products themselves and choose which ones they want. It’s a great way to sell the technologies! I managed to make a lot of sales tonight, as the solar lights shone brightly and attracted a lot of people.” — Mama Emi Tech Fairs, organised by Kopernik and/or by the Wonder Woman independently. Since joining Kopernik, Mama Emi has done about 15 Tech Fairs both for her own community and neighbouring communities. This is the first time she had a Tech Fair at night and she sold more than 10 technologies, where usually she sells 4-5 technologies during a day-time Tech Fair.
Read moreSeeing things positively is the best way to overcome challenges
26 July 2016
Hilaria has many years of experience with the ups and downs of business and how to overcome challenges. This year, her biggest challenge has been caring for a sick child, which took up a lot of time and caused her to dip into her savings and business capitol. In July, the Solar Sister team supported her by bringing “movie night” to her town, and showing the movie where Hilaria was featured as a Solar Sister entrepreneur as part of Solar Sister’s Women+Energy:WESHINE campaign. That night, Hilaria was able to kickstart her business with new sales. You can watch the video on the YouTube channel and see the full WESHINE campaign. Read Hilaria’s first interview, here, to see how she became a Solar Sister and her advice for other women entrepreneurs. Read her new interview, below, to learn about her advice for overcoming business challenges. You have been an entrepreneur for several years now, and you know that there are some times that are good and some times that are hard. Can you tell me what some of the most challenging parts of running your own business are? Or a recent example? Challenges include low capital compared to customer’s demand, diseases that lead to the use of capital, and business being seasonal. During farming most customers invest in farming and can’t buy products in large quantity. Also customers sometimes want products on credit. You’ve managed to stick with it for many years despite those challenges. What have you learned are the best ways to overcome challenges? Being proactive, also…
Read moreIbu Dasri: From a sanitarian to a Wonder Woman
14 June 2016
In East Lombok where I live, knowledge of good hygiene and sanitation is very minimal, nearing nothing at all. A lot of people do not have a toilet in their house and open defecation still happens in many areas. Additionally, many people still drink and cook with unclean water from various water sources. Health is my biggest concern for the community and health problems in this area mainly result from poor hygiene practices. That’s when I decided to join local NGO Yayasan Masyarakat Peduli (YMP) and my my work educating my community about hygiene and sanitation began. I went from one village to another to introducing this new idea to people. I guess I had an advantage because I had already been working in the local health center. People knew me but it was not always an easy process. Thankfully, slowly people became aware that a healthy life only starts with hygiene and good sanitation. YMP later partnered up with Kopernik to raise awareness about the importance of drinking clean and safe water. And that was when I first saw one of Kopernik technologies, the Nazava Water Filter. This water filter really helps people in the community to access clean and safe drinking water, as there is no hassle in boiling water. Many people used to drink directly from the well. Of course, this is not safe but they did not want to waste their time and energy to boil the water first. Thanks to Nazava Water Filter, people can…
Read moreMama Emi: My very first training
14 June 2016
After my first (and believe me, surprising) sales of two cookstoves, I asked Widi to sign me up in the Wonder Women program. Not long after, Widi came to my house carrying a couple of books and papers. He explained to me that if I were to join the program, I should receive some training about all the technology available and how to manage the sales. As I am naturally curious, I couldn’t wait to see what other wonders these technologies could do. Widi then took out several other technologies and demonstrated their use and benefits one-by-one. It was as I had expected. These other technologies presented the same kinds of benefits as the cookstove; saving a lot of energy, time and costs. Of course after hearing the explanation, I bought some solar lights and a water filter for my own personal use. The water filter really saves my time and energy, now I don’t have to boil water, I just have to put water into the filter, and it’s ready to drink! I bought some small solar lights because the electricity in my village isn’t that all reliable, and I can save the cost of electricity bill. Widi showed me how to do simple bookkeeping, to track sales and the repayment money. This was the most important part, as now I can ensure I have the record of who has paid and who hasn’t. He also explained how to fill in the sales receipts, so both the buyer and…
Read moreMs. Bimala Rai, ICS Entrepreneur
29 March 2016I am Bimala Rai, 32 years of age and living in Maina Maini village, Udayapur district of Nepal. I am a single parent of two children: a daughter and a son. I have been separated from my husband since last five years. To sustain my children I started operating a small shop in the street selling ‘chatpate’ – a spicy fast food. Fortunately, I came to know about improved cookstoves and the training being organized by WEE-Nepal Project in July 2015. I was selected in the training which provided me a new skill and also a key to boost my confidence. I looked upon this skill as a prime source of income for my children’s upbringing. Today I work together with Kalpana Rai another WEE-Nepal trainee and I am so encouraged to move ahead with this work. To start with the installation myself and Kalpana Rai have jointly borrowed a loan of NPR 150,000 from Sahayougi Saving and Credit Cooperative, a Local Financial Institute. We have invested this amount into place orders for the metallic components for the stove so as to expedite selling and installation of the stoves. I am very excited and hopeful in this endeavor. However the challenge is on demand collection and encouraging behavior change; “Now I understand what the importance of improved cookstoves in our kitchen is. But do I have to pay for the cookstoves?” these are common questions asked by the village community when we interact with them. I need to motivate them…
Read more18 February 2016
Sometimes it’s hard for me to keep track of all sales, installments, and payments. So, I always record all of Kopernik’s technology sales history in this book – that way not a single Rupiah will go missing.
Read moreHow it all started
18 February 2016It started out just like any other day: I opened the small shop in my house and spent the afternoon weaving traditional Flores ikat. My house is located on the main road of Bena Traditional Village. People who are passing through or visiting the ancient village often stop to buy snacks, drinks, or even ikat from my shop. Little did I know, that sunny day in June turned out to be the start of a new venture. It was a little after midday, when a friendly man on a motorbike stopped in front of my house. I could tell that he was resting from a long journey. He was carrying some sort of stove on the back of his bike. I was curious so I asked him, “Hey, what is that?” It was a biomass cookstove and according to the man – his name is Widi, Kopernik’s Senior Program Officer – it’s much safer and more efficient compared to our traditional three stone fire. As a mother who spend a lot of time in the kitchen, of course I was interested! Widi then introduced me to Kopernik and their Wonder Women program. He told me I could sell the cookstoves, and other technologies such as solar lamps and water filters. I would earn a margin from every sale. I got even more interested. I actually have no sales experience, but since I need no capital to start, I might as well give it a try! I decided to by one…
Read more