This project will introduce creative program to make solar lights available at an affordable cost to the poorest in selected families targeting girls. They will benefit from the availability of lighting derived from clean solar energy for the provision of more reading hours for their school age children, and creating more opportunity for improved health and savings from frequent purchase of kerosene.
Performance of girls in rural communities has remained poor due to a number of reasons. One such factor is the lack of facilities to facilitate reading at household level. Over 70% of electricity distribution in Uganda is in urban areas. The main source of rural lighting in Uganda is kerosene, which is very polluting, causes indoor air pollution enough to cause severe eye and respiratory problems for children.Kerosene lanterns emit 1/3rd of a ton of carbon dioxide every year
Households will be provided solar lamps to be used for indoor lighting at night, and for helping parents support urgent children's tasks outside school. School children can study & function for more number of hours at night. The aim is to replace kerosene lamps with solar energy charged lamps with small batteries that use very little power. At initial stage households will be provided the solar utility light LED bulbs which is portable and can be used anywhere traditional power is not accessible
Cost sharing will be introduced where households will contribute amount that is less than what they currently pay for kerosene as a means to show their involvement and ownership in the project The low cost solar panel will be utilized; each solar panel with one bulb and battery enough to facilitate home lighting and children's reading.