The Africa Enterprise Challenge Fund (AECF) has launched a $1.2 million Innovation Fund to unlock the potential of renewable energy to create new business opportunities in Mozambique.
Through the fund, companies and entrepreneurs in the country can apply for funding to strengthen market readiness of innovations, as well as secure financial, technical and networking support to expand existing prototypes that have already been proven.
Examples that the Fund seeks to support include: solutions that reduce the negative impacts associated with the use of traditional meal preparation methods at the household and institutional level; build climate change resilience among communities; and support productive use such as water pumping, agricultural processing, and cooling and refrigeration services.
In applying, companies and entrepreneurs will need to demonstrate how their proposed innovations will transform the livelihoods of low-income households through job creation and livelihood diversification.
Under the Sustainable Development Goals, the world has set an ambitious goal of ensuring universal access to reliable and sustainable energy by the end of the decade. With only half of the African continent without access to electricity, and two-thirds of it lacking access to clean meal preparation solutions, additional investment is needed to foster innovation and accelerate the adoption of modern energy.
The Innovation Fund leverages the AECF’s REACT (Renewable Energy and Climate Technology Adaptation) initiative, which was launched to support the private sector in developing and scaling up clean energy technologies for rural communities in Africa. The Fund will invest in technologies that respond to market needs, and also accelerate the development of existing solutions to better serve African communities, rather than in prototype stage technologies.
According to AECF’s Executive Director Victoria Sabula, the Innovation Fund is key to enhancing large-scale transformation within local communities.
” Through this Fund, we hope to discover new ways in which renewable energy – whether domestic, community or commercial – can be used to generate income and create jobs,” she added.
The Africa Enterprise Challenge Fund (AECF) is an organization that supports companies in innovation, job creation and in leveraging investments to create resilience and sustainable incomes in rural and marginalized communities in Africa. Launched in 2008, AECF has invested in 292 businesses in more than 40 value chains in 26 countries in sub-Saharan Africa. The Innovation Fund will also be launched in Burkina
