Bella is one of our youngest SolarAid fundraisers, choosing to go screen free (no TV, phone, tablet or laptop!) for 2 whole days to help other children to do their homework with safe light. She set a target of £70 – to which she donated £5 of her own money – smashing that by raising […]
Anger boiled over after a national blackout, which saw babies dying in incubators, yet outages are frequent—for the lucky 10 percent of people with electricity in Malawi. Rural health worker Patrick Kamzitu is relaxed about the long and frequent power cuts that plague Malawi and which recently almost brought it to a halt when the […]
At SolarAid our main focus is on getting solar lights to people in rural Africa, where there is no electricity. But people in African cities often suffer from similar frustrations because the African electricity grid is notoriously unreliable and, even in capital cities, daily rolling blackouts are a common occurrence. This week we heard from one […]
Twenty five years is a long time for an idea to come to fruition, but we finally got there: SolarAid’s partners Lloyd’s of London have agreed to divest from coal because of climate change. This is excellent news – but it comes a couple of decades too late. Our Founder and Chair, Jeremy Leggett, first presented the case for […]
Cristina Westphal, one of our excellent supporters, has helped an NGO called Hope for Girls and Women get access to solar lighting to help SolarAid’s mission by supporting girls and women in Tanzania. Here she tells the story in her own words, explaining the amazing results. “I’d like to tell you about the group I […]
Zambia is currently experiencing a Cholera outbreak which has already claimed the lives of 67 people, and as of last week (11.01.2018) it had spread to the Copperbelt. Cholera is a bacterial disease which causes severe diarrhoea and dehydration and is usually spread through water. The government has spent the last week clearing markets in the town centre […]
As 2017 comes to a close we want to send a big THANK YOU to all our supporters and everyone who has helped promote SolarAid and fundraised for us over the year. It’s been another eventful year and as we pass the winter solstice, with the shortest day of sunshine, it seems important to take stock, reflect […]
During a recent visit to Malawi, I travelled with our team to the district of Salima, a few hours outside of Lilongwe, to see how our team is working to introduce rural communities to solar power and lighting. On a Saturday morning, we met up with local school teacher, to deliver a new batch of […]
This film for SolarAid was shot on Mafia Island, Tanzania. The crew began shooting 30 seconds after meeting Athmani. The cameraman, Brad, carried a small camera on a stick, and was accompanied by @Ralph_Greenland from SolarAid UK. The translator is Irene Chalya from SolarAid Tanzania.
As recently highlighted in the Guardian newspaper, Malawi has been suffering from an extended period of drought throughout 2017, with water levels at the country’s main hydro-electric plant falling to critical levels, resulting in major blackouts across the country. For people connected to the electricity grid, this means they are being forced to look for alternative power solutions […]