Latest News in the News Section

Sustainable Business Award Winners!

Fri, 17 May 2013 05:51:51 -0400

Last night SolarAid were crowned winners of the Communicating Sustainability category at the Guardian Sustainable Business Awards 2013.

The Guardian Sustainable Business Awards reward innovation and impact in corporate sustainability. They were looking for "cross-platform campaigns that have made an impact, campaigns that have taken sustainability to the masses, secured strong response and made a big difference".

We presented our SunnyMoney's Schools Campaign in Tanzania as a successful model of how to ensure effective marketing and distribution in remote African regions. The judges recognised the fantastic growth in sales figures they achieved last year, up by more than 700% in some regions.

It is fantastic that our SunnyMoney colleagues are being recognised for their innovative approach to solar light distribution, specifically their ability to cover vast, sparsely populated areas with poor infrastructure.

It is very exciting times here at SolarAid as we continue to make giant strides towards achieving our goal of eradicating the kerosene lamp from Africa by 2020. We are a charity that is beginning to be recognised by industry specialists, not just for our simple and effective message, but for our impact as well. We calculate that our solar lights have reached around two million people so far. And this is just the beginning.

Next up, we have the 2013 Ashden Awards. Watch this space for more news.

Pippa Palmer, SolarAid's Managing Director said: "The cheers were for the whole team - across London, Kenya, Malawi, Tanzania, Zambia and Senegal – who work tirelessly to deliver our innovative, low-cost peer-to-peer social marketing strategy which is enabling millions of people to live more sustainably through solar light ownership"

You can read a case study of our SunnyMoney Schools Programme in Tanzania by clicking this link.

Distributing solar lights: come rain or shine

Wed, 15 May 2013 08:02:29 -0400

Here is a fantastic blog from one of our intrepid Field Coordinators in the Eastern Province of Zambia. Mayase M’Shanga works for our non-profit trading arm, SunnyMoney. She organises and conducts head teacher meetings, delivers lights, makes presentations and helps conduct research to ensure we’re being as effective as possible with our programmes.

The ground work that is required with our SunnyMoney Schools Programme does not come without risks. As this blog goes to show, reaching that last mile, sometimes under hazardous weather conditions is certainly not for the faint hearted. Without Mayase’s determination, skills and expertise we would not be making such giant leaps towards our goal of eradicating the Kerosene lamp. We are a charity that certainly appreciates the hard work and dedication of its staff.

Blog: Mayase M’Shanga
SunnyMoney Field Coordinator, Zambia

Mayase M’Shanga

“January started on a really good note. Everyone was happy to be back in the office after the Christmas and New Year festivities. After a series of meetings in the Southern province, the SunnyMoney Schools team was geared and ready for Head Teacher meetings in Mazabuka and Monze. I must have been one of the most excited to be back in the field because a little too much time in the office makes us field people start to feel a tad redundant.

Being the rainy season, we were forewarned by the District Education Board (DEB) about the worrying sate of the roads in some areas. It was also quite cold so we weren’t exactly willing to swim across to get there. Fortunately, the DEB was kind enough locate the head teacher meetings at accessible venues to allow for almost every school to attend the meeting.

Kazungula and Kaloba were the last zones scheduled for the week. We got there quite late because our guide had underestimated the state of the road. Though the Head teachers were not so happy about being kept waiting, after the presentation they said it was definitely worth it. Now just as we were loading up the bus to leave, it started to pour. It rained heavily for about 15-20minutes, so heavy, no one was able to leave.

As soon as it toned down, we were on our way, led by a head teacher who owned a Toyota Hilux. He suggested a longer but slightly better route. When we got to his turn-off, we were on our own. We ran into quite a few herds of cattle being led back to the villages because it was now past 6pm.

There was so much water on the road it looked like it had turned into a river. We could barely see the road and the ditches we had driven over on our way there. We could feel the road disintegrate under the bus as we moved because the current was so strong. As we anticipated, the tyre fell into the ditch on the side of the road and the bus couldn’t move anymore.

Some village men were kind enough to stop and try to help us move the bus by lifting it and trying to put logs under it but to no avail. After over half an hour of trying, they gave up and suggested we ask the nearby village for oxen to help tow us out seeing as it was now almost 8pm. Our guide, Mr Hachizibe, left with them to try to get help while Dominic (the driver) and I remained behind.

I looked at the time and it was now 9:30pm. Just as I started looking at the boxes in the back of the bus and wondering how I could lay them out comfortably enough to make a bed for the night, Mr Hachizibe came back with a light truck owner who was well equipped with rope, a pick-axe and a hoe. They were able to dig up the tyres and tow us out. Though it was now almost 11pm, it was such a relief to get back to our accommodation, take a hot shower, have a quick meal and get into bed.”

Blog: Partnerships Manager

Thu, 09 May 2013 09:20:01 -0400

Charlie Miller is our Partnerships Manager. He has worked in the charity sector for eight years and currently manages our relationships with governments, aid agencies and corporate partners. He has just written a blog for Business Fights Poverty entitled: Agility, Innovation and Open-Sourcing – Crucial for enhancing ‘Bottom of the Pyramid Marketing’ and Distribution.

In the blog, Charlie talks about the importance of field-testing multiple ideas to find a good one. Once an innovation is discovered, organisations both in the corporate sector and the charity sector, need to be agile - so that they can rapidly refine it and scale it.

Finally he reflects upon how a form of open-sourcing, sharing what we’ve learnt and helping others to distribute solar lights, will help us to achieve our goals. This basis of agility and innovation is what led us to become the largest seller of portable lights in rural Africa.

To read the blog, and find out more about our business model and the future of solar lighting in Africa click the link below.

Read Charlie's blog here.

Ray of Sunshine Blog

Tue, 07 May 2013 05:55:19 -0400

Above: The SunnyMoney team talking to children in Narok, Kenya about the benefits of solar power

Blogger: Kat Harrison, Social Impact and Research Manager

Twitter: @sunrise_kat

Tumblr: http://sunrisekat.tumblr.com

This week's Ray of Sunshine Blog comes from Narok South in Kenya. Kat Harrison and the team have recently been conducting research in the region, where our solar projects have had a significant impact on the quality of life of rural African communities.

Kat speaks to John Kuriuki, a farmer whose children go to Olonkerin school. John has recently purchased a solar light for his household and talks about the benefits his family are seeing already. He states that his children study longer hours thanks to the light and the symptoms they suffered while using Kerosene have all but disappeared.

The family now live in a completely kerosene-free household, saving themselves around £110 per year. That's around 10% of john's income.

Click here to read Kat's blog in full and find out how much impact one small, high-tech solar lamp can have on a rural African family.

What do you think? Tweet your comments to @solaraid

Follow Kat on Twitter: @sunrise_kat

Six years of sales in six months

Thu, 02 May 2013 10:33:58 -0400

John Keane, the SunnyMoney Managing Director, talks about our successes and failures in his latest blog. Here at SolarAid we firmly believe that the best way to achieve our goals is to learn from our mistakes.

John notes that in the past six months we sold more solar lamps in Africa than we did in the previous six years. This is great news and just goes to illustrate the fantastic success our revised business models have been witnessing. As John puts it, we have simply started doing more of what was working and less of what was not.

John confirms that we have sold around 338,000 solar lights so far with the majority coming in the latter half of the last financial year. This year we have set ourselves the even more optimistic target of selling a further 660,000 solar lights.

That’s right, this year we plan to make it a million! If we reach our target, with your help, we would have sold over one million solar lamps, improving the lives of many many more.

Click this link to read John’s blog.

Click this link to find out more about our audacious ‘make it a million!’ challenge and discover how you can be a part of something special.

Spreading our solar projects

Wed, 01 May 2013 10:40:16 -0400

We thought we would give you a little insight in to some of the ways in which we help distribute our solar lights to so many rural African communities. We asked one of the SunnyMoney team to tell us a little bit about the work they have been doing recently in helping us spread our solar projects. This is what they had to say…

SunnyMoney at the Green Expo, Zambia - April 2013

Claire at the Green Expo - Zambia

Hi everyone. My name is Claire Arthurs. I’ve been a marketing volunteer at SunnyMoney Zambia, the non-profit trading arm of international charity SolarAid, for the last three months. I’ve been working on marketing planning for our Schools Campaign (where we work with local schools to help educate and distribute our solar lights), follow-up sales and learning about how we work with retailers to help us get more lights to more people across Zambia.

Recently the SunnyMoney Zambia team returned to the world of exhibitions for The Green Expo at Lusaka’s National Museum for the second time. The Green Expo is about promoting sustainability in Zambia to show that green living can be ‘cool and fun’. So, we simply had to be there!

Visitors to the expo were mostly the expat community, with many of them working for NGOs, so our aim was; 1) To sell our fabulous lights 2) To find potential partnership opportunities to broaden our reach in Zambia and 3) To increase awareness of our brand, what we do, and the impact of bringing solar energy to rural communities.

In the run up to the expo we invited fellow sustainable enthusiasts to visit us at the show so we could let them know about our special expo discounts. We sold three PowerPack 5W systems and had a few other calls and visitors in response to our invitations, so it was already worth our while and we’ll definitely do it again.

In return for our pre-expo invitations, which also helped to promote the show, the organisers gave us the chance to be interviewed by Movie TV, a local Zambian station, which was aired on Saturday night. We’re trying to get hold of the interview clip!

We also had a prize draw to win a free d.light S2 as an incentive for visitors to leave their details with us. We will follow up the interested parties with news about new products/light deliveries/friendly reminders of where to find us etc.

The show itself was actually a bit quieter than we had hoped overall, but the visitors we spoke to were all very interested in SunnyMoney’s work and impressed by our products. Other solar companies (for profit) were also exhibiting (Muhanya Solar, Solar Zuwa, SunPower) so it was important for us to have a presence and show why we are different. We secured a TV interview, an opportunity to advertise on a Zambian online business directory for free and other potential sales leads (fingers crossed). We also had the privilege of talking about our schools programme to influential people like the Vice President’s wife, Charlotte Scott, and deputy director of the UN in Zambia, so feel that we sufficiently made our mark.

Thanks to everyone who helped with preparations and manning the stand!

Claire Arthurs

If you would like any further information about SunnyMoney, our non-profit trading arm, you can visit their website by clicking here.

Lighting Africa publicise our work

Tue, 30 Apr 2013 07:46:19 -0400

Lighting Africa, a project set up by the World Bank to bring lighting improvements to ‘off-grid’ Africa, posted an article on their website a few days ago focussing on our non-profit trading arm, SunnyMoney, who they describe as a ‘distributor of quality, affordable solar lanterns’.

The article is a case study of a family in the rural Kilimanjaro region of Northern Tanzania, an area which experiences around 12 hours of blanket darkness each day. The family interviewed in the article bought their solar light in May 2012 after SunnyMoney representatives visited a local primary school.

Victoria Materu is a mother of two, who no longer “worries about the risk of kerosene spilling and burning the house” thanks to our small, portable, affordable devices. Victoria also confirms that her family now benefit from five hours of lighting each night after purchasing one of our lamps, rather than three hours with the traditional kerosene lamp. The light helps her children study for longer and is also “very strong and powerful”.

In addition, Victoria saves around $35 per year thanks to her solar light, which is now spent on “buying food and paying for school expenses”.

The interview was carried out by our Social Impact and Research manager Kat Harrison. This is not an isolated story, Kat and the research team are finding that the majority of solar users interviewed are experiencing extra hours of lighting, educational, health and financial benefits thanks to this one small empowering device.

To read the article in full, click this link.

If you would like to read more testimonies about the positive effect of these solar lights then you can follow Kat on twitter or read her Sunrise_Kat blog here.