Electrifying Grannies

Posted by Verity on March 17, 2025 in Black lives matter, climate change, Environment, feminism, Human rights, Living today, News, Technology, Women's equality issues | 6 comments

I find that if it’s good news you want, the World Service is sometimes – unexpectedly – the place to go for it. After a long snooze on the sofa, while retiring to bed at an unconscionably late hour, I came across a glimmer of hope while brushing my teeth and listening to – what else? – Radio 4.

Combining environmental benefits, opportunities for women – older women, moreover – and international cooperation, this particular item of news was like a small voice raised against the tide of war, famine and climate catastrophe that usually overwhelms the airwaves.

So what had got my dame’s antennae standing to attention? A story about the solar grandmothers. Women in their sixties from five African villages who have been training as solar engineers so that they can bring solar power to their villages in Upper Ghana. They have now successfully connected 150 homes in their communities to electricity, replacing the kerosene lanterns which are damaging both to individual households and to the planet.

The choice of these women to train at Barefoot College as solar engineers was entirely in line with the UN’s Sustainable Development Goal 5, which calls for gender equality and empowerment for women and girls at all levels. The focus on older women for this project is to ensure continuity: men and younger women would have been likely to migrate from their villages after training, whereas older women are firmly rooted in their communities, with a desire to serve them permanently.

Training at Barefoot College was no small undertaking: it’s in India for a start. Dakota, one of the five women spoke for them all when she said,’ When they selected us to go to India, we were afraid because we have never travelled abroad before. Our biggest fear was that we only speak our local language and haven’t been to school, so going to school in another country sounded odd.’

Dakota and her companions joined women from several other countries for six months of practical training in applied solar technology, based on sign language and colour coded circuits. Now they can build and maintain solar-powered lamps and chargers, and install solar power in homes across their communities.

Salamatu sums up the changes they have brought about: ‘Everyone is happy with us because we have connected several homes to electricity. It is such a great joy to have light, charge our phones, watch TV, and do other basic things with the power.’ She has gone on to train her youngest son, though as he has indeed now gone to the city, he can only support her in her work when he comes back on holiday.

Barefoot College, which I had never heard of before, is a veritable haven of global greenness and collaboration. For a start, this ‘women-centred global network dedicated to sustainable development for marginalised rural communities in over 90 countries’ has turned out more than 3,500 ‘solar mamas’. It has run programmes in regenerative agriculture and rural enterprise. Around 2.5m people have benefitted from its work.

My first thought on reading about Barefoot College was, how much funding does it receive from USAID? It’s hard to tell, as the college doesn’t receive funding from them directly, but it does collaborate with organisations that do.  According to its 2022 annual report, it received only 2% of its funding from governments, the rest coming from corporate donations, gifts from foundations and individuals, and earned revenue. Let’s hope this means its work empowering the world’s most economically disadvantaged women is safe.