Nigeria To Benefit £16.7m UK SolarNigeria Grants
The UK Department for International Development has approved an additional £16.7 million grant for SolarNigeria programme aimed at scaling the market for solar home lighting and power in Nigeria to enable millions of Nigerian households experience reliable power by 2020.
Consequently, a number of banks and solar specialists will be invited to apply for the grant in the next pilot scheme, while SolarNigeria will help capable solar vendors and financiers to rapidly expand their capacity to reach consumers with financed solar solutions.
“Pilot programmes in 2015 provided capacity building grants of £1.5 million to 16 companies. In 2016 a financing pilot will provide £0.5 million in grants to mobilise the provision of commercial finance into the value chain for household scale solar light and power systems,” the Head of Consumer Markets, SolarNigeria, Leigh Vial, saId in a statement.
Already, the programme has supported 49,000 households across the country to acquire solar systems in just three months this year, by helping solar suppliers and financiers scale up and providing Nigerians access to the equipment on full commercial terms.
The statement informed that more than 14,000 of the homes which have benefited are in northern Nigeria where grid deficiencies and the need for reliable power are the most acute.
