This October, as the world marks International E-Waste Day and International Repair Day 2025, SolarAid is proud to reflect on the role repair plays in creating a more sustainable future.
Repairing isn’t just about fixing what’s broken – it’s about extending the life of products, reducing waste, saving costs, and empowering communities with the skills and confidence to make solar energy last.
SolarAid as a Repair Trailblazer
In June 2024, SolarAid was selected by the Global Distributors Collective (GDC) to act as a Repair Trailblazer under the GDC Innovation Launchpad. Our mission was clear: to mentor and train last-mile solar distributors across sub-Saharan Africa, supporting them to build sustainable repair services into their business models.
By doing so, we sought to address three key challenges:
- Longevity– ensuring solar products serve households for many years.
- E-waste – reducing the growing problem of discarded electronics in rural areas.
- Local capacity – building repair knowledge and services within communities themselves.
Supporting Local Repair Adopters
Through this programme, SolarAid worked with three incredible partners: Kukula Solar (Zambia), Nyalore Impact (Kenya), and Natfort Energy (Zimbabwe).
These organisations, known as Repair Adopters, were already strong in last-mile distribution. Our role was to help them integrate repair into their day-to-day operations.
We began with an intensive in-person training at our Lusaka office in July 2024, where participants developed both business and technical repair skills. From September 2024 to February 2025, we continued with structured online mentorship – including peer-to-peer exchanges, one-to-one guidance, and practical sessions on stock management, supply chain planning, quality assurance, and customer engagement.
What We Achieved Together
By early 2025, each of the Repair Adopters had launched their own repair services, including:
- Hosting community repair days, where customers could bring in faulty solar products for diagnosis and repair.
- Embedding repair business models into their everyday operations.
- Using repair as a way to build trust and long-term relationships with customers.
These efforts show that when repair is embedded into last-mile distribution of solar, it becomes a powerful tool for both impact and sustainability.
Lessons Learned
Of course, challenges remain. The biggest barrier identified across all three countries was access to affordable and reliable spare parts. Without stronger spare parts supply chains, scaling repair services will remain difficult.
This insight highlights a broader, sector-wide challenge: we need collective action to make spare parts more available and accessible across last-mile markets.
Looking Ahead
Despite these challenges, the Innovation Launchpad proved that repair works – and that with the right support, solar distributors can embed it into their business models. For SolarAid, this is just the beginning. We’re committed to strengthening repair ecosystems, empowering communities, and reducing e-waste.
As we celebrate both the International Day of Repair and International E-Waste Day this month, we’re reminded that every repaired product tells a story of resilience, innovation, and the belief that clean energy should last.
Keeping Solar Solutions Alive: The Next Chapter for Our Repair App 🔧☀️
Across sub-Saharan Africa, millions of life-changing off-grid solar products have reached rural families. But, like all things, these products don’t last forever. Eventually, they stop working and require repair. Unfortunately, repair services, quality spare parts, and technical guidance are often not adequately available, especially in remote areas.
At SolarAid, we believe repair should be the norm, not the exception. That’s why we created the SunnyMoney Repair App – a free tool that puts step-by-step repair guidance directly into the hands of technicians, agents, and even customers themselves. With it, products that might have been discarded can instead be repaired, reused, and kept in service for years longer – delivering light, power, and opportunity where it’s needed most.
📲 Evolving for Greater Impact
With the support from our partner RS Group, we’ve recently updated the app to improve its usability and ensure it continues serving frontline technicians. Soon, we’ll be taking the next step: developing a roadmap for Version 2, which will expand beyond basic solar light repairs to cover a wider range of products – keeping even more off-grid technologies in use and out of the waste pile.
♻️ Extending Product Life, Reducing Waste
By reducing premature disposal and enabling products to stay relevant and useful, the Repair App helps build a more circular, sustainable energy future – one where access lasts far beyond a product’s first life.
Every repair means fewer candles and kerosene lamps used in rural homes. It means less e-waste, lower carbon emissions, and households saving money by continuing to use what they already have.
As we plan for Version 2, we’re excited to work with partners, developers, and the wider sector to make repair a cornerstone of off-grid energy access.