- The African Enterprise Challenge Fund (AECF) has launched a US$1.2 million Innovation Fund.
- The Fund focuses on the renewable energy sector for Businesses and entrepreneurs in Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Kenya, Liberia, Mali, Mozambique, and Zimbabwe.
The African Enterprise Challenge Fund (AECF) has launched a US$1.2 million Innovation Fund. The Fund focuses on the renewable energy sector for Businesses and entrepreneurs in Burkina Faso, Ethiopia, Kenya, Liberia, Mali, Mozambique, and Zimbabwe.
The Fund targets to create new business opportunities in the renewable energy sector and aims at strengthening market readiness of emerging innovations, as well as secure financial, technical, and networking support for taking existing proven prototypes to scale.
The Fund proposes to support solutions that reduce the negative impacts associated with the use of traditional cooking options at the household and institutional levels, build climate change resilience among communities and support productive uses such as water pumping, agro-processing, cooling, and refrigeration services. The applicants have to prove how their innovations will transform the livelihoods of low-income households by generating employment and diversification of livelihoods. Technologies that cater to the market needs, or enhance the development of existing solutions to better serve African communities will be eligible for the support of the Fund . Technologies in the prototype stage will not be eligible.
Africa is still trailing behind the Sustainable Development Goals of universal access to reliable and sustainable energy by the end of the decade. The Innovation Fund is based on AECF’s Renewable Energy and Adaptation to Climate Technologies (REACT) initiative. The objective is to support the private sector develop and expand its clean energy technologies to Africa’s rural communities.
Chief Executive Officer of AECF, Victoria Sabula, remarked that the Innovation Fund is expected to enhance large scale transformation within local communities.
