KARIBU Solar Power

Produces modular solar lamps and mobile phone chargers.
2013 SEED Africa Award Winner Clean Energy Dar es Salaam, Tanzania

The modular solar lamp consists of a solar panel, a rechargeable battery or mobile phone charger and a light. Users buy the battery and the light components and pay for the solar panel in small increments. After just a few weeks, they own the solar panel and can charge the battery on their own. KARIBU Solar Power’s “rent-to-own” programme and “pay per charge” model replicate the cash flow for buying kerosene. Costs to users are under USD 1 a day, making the lamp affordable for the 500+ million Africans.

Eco-Inclusive Impacts

KARIBU is making high quality solar lighting and mobile phone charging affordable, allowing also poorer communities to enjoy the benefits of solar lighting and energy.
  • Increasing children’s ability to study and learn at home by providing light after sunset.
  • Improving health and safety, especially for women and children, by eliminating toxic fumes and injuries caused by using kerosene at home.
  • Providing an off-grid lighting solution that relies on renewable energy helping mitigate climate change.
  • Reducing carbon emissions by offsetting on average 100 kg of CO2 per solar lamp per year (including CO2 emitted in transportation of kerosene to the end consumers).
  • Increasing families’ incomes by up to USD 100 every year in savings on fuel, candles and batteries – this money can then be better allocated to healthcare, education and training.
  • Increasing revenues for owners of small local shops through the sale of a profitable and affordable product, using a franchising distribution model.

Partners

This enterprise is supported through its partnerships with various stakeholders, ranging from national and international organisations, investors, research institutes, suppliers, governmental bodies, NGOs, other social and environmental enterprises and more.

Foundation for Sustainable Enterprise and Development is a Canadian NGO which supports sustainable development, wealth creation and poverty alleviation, providing grounded action research, education and shared learning.

Kidogo Early Childhood Development is working to offer high-quality childcare to families living at the bottom of the economic pyramid through a network of day-care centres. The enterprise’s solar lamps will be distributed via Kidogo’s centres, providing affordable solar power to its beneficiaries.

Positive Innovation for the Next Generation (PING) is a youth-led organisation that implements health or youth-related technology projects on the ground, along with intensive high schoolage and college IT mentorship programs.

SEED Library

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Collaborate with KARIBU Solar Power

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Adam Camenzuli
Mayfair Plaza - Top Floor Central Building, Old Bagamoyo Road
Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
Tel: +255 769 224 000

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