eCARE commissions 50th PV-powered business center

True to its word, the eCARE project has commissioned the 50th solar-powered rural business center at Sakora Wonoo, a small community in the Kwabre District of Ghana's Ashanti region.  Funded in part by the United Nations Foundation and Telecom Management Partner, eCARE was launched in December 2005 with the active support of local NGO KITE, Ghana's Ministry of Communications and the Ghana Commercial Bank. We reported on this project back in June 2006 and have been closely tracking it as an interesting example of public-private partnership for universal access to energy and ICTs.  Though starting up as providers of renewably-powered voice telephony and Internet access in rural communities, many of the entrepreneurs now want to grow their businesses into multi-purpose energy enterprises, capable supplying renewable electric power for a variety of other income-generating activities.  KITE is helping them prepare bankable business plans and to secure financing to make this happen.  Recent innovations in energy and information technologies, combined with innovative financing models and government support appear to be creating opportunities for small or medium sized enterprises in Africa to go where the big utilities fear to tread--rural and peri-urban communities "at the bottom of the pyramid" and beyond the grid.