African Solar Rise

Kiva conducts regular, ongoing monitoring of all Lending Partners, but only posts status updates here in response to relevant, major changes at the partner.

Status update — March, 28 2019

Kiva and African Solar Rise (ASR) have agreed to end their partnership after 5 years and $138,600 in loans raised. This decision was made due to technical challenges ASR faced with their solar systems. ASR joined Kiva as an experimental partner in 2013 with the purpose of financing entrepreneurs who wanted to start renewable energy businesses in Tanzania. Between June 2013 and March 2018, 12 entrepreneurs received Kiva loans to increase their solar inventory and 131 individuals received loans to purchase solar systems for their homes and businesses. 

At the beginning of 2018, borrowers started experiencing technical issues with their solar systems and stopped repaying their loans by April. For the last year, Kiva has given ASR time to try to resolve the technical issues and resume borrower repayments. However, ASR was unable to fix all of the issues or claim the warranty provided by their supplier, so ASR’s final loans with Kiva have been defaulted and this partnership is now closed.

Partner Description:

African Solar Rise is a nonprofit organization committed to bringing sustainable and renewable energy to developing communities in Africa, particularly in Tanzania. Founded in 2010, it helps entrepreneurs start businesses focused on renewable energy. The organization assists clients in writing business plans, accessing lending capital, and procuring high quality products. African Solar Rise supports a variety of projects, including solar-powered water wells, solar lantern rental services, solar product retail stores, and solar system loans for savings and loan cooperatives (SAACOs) to purchase and resell solar products to their members.

Even though Tanzania is considered to be one of Africa's poorest countries, it has annual GDP growth of 6%. As a result, demand for electricity is on the rise, making energy supply one of the country’s most important challenges.

The majority of Tanzania's energy supply comes from hydroelectric plants, and a smaller portion is derived from coal and gas. More frequent and longer lasting power outages are a problem during droughts. Currently, only 10% to 20% of the population has access to the government's energy supply.

Kiva lenders’ funds will help African Solar Rise to provide affordable loans to poor Tanzanians starting their own renewable energy-focused businesses.

Kiva funding will also be used by African Solar Rise to offer SAACOs solar system loans. These new income generating loans will allow the organizations to use to purchase solar systems that will then be provided to their members on a leasing scheme.

A unique lending approach:

The organization’s target clients are entrepreneurs who are willing to start renewable energy businesses, but lack access to training and resources. African Solar Rise develops clients’ technical and entrepreneurial skills at its training center in Dar es Salaam and by partnering with microfinance institutions in Tanzania to provide credit to entrepreneurs.

The training program helps clients get the knowledge they need to start a business and make it sustainable in the future. African Solar Rise also partners with universities in Europe so that students can visit with clients and share their knowledge in different areas.

African Solar Rise has received several awards in Europe, including the Challenge Entrepreneurship Award from the German Business Foundation, the Social Entrepreneurship Award from the University of St. Gallen and the Create a Difference Award from AT Kearney.