Finding new energy : poverty alleviation through technology

Last week, I attended an extremely interesting and inspiring meeting: the Powerful Initiative Meeting, hosted by Practical Action at the Institution of Mechanical Engineers. This meeting brought together stakeholders from businesses, foundations, think tanks, the UN, NGO and INGOs to discuss access to energy and energy services in the developing world and at the alleviation of energy poverty.

I was very moved by the wealth of discussion during the meeting. My relationship with Practical Action began 3 months ago when we met in Clarence House, hosted by HRH the Prince of Wales. The Prince’s Start Initiative is a new plan to introduce citizens of the UK to new energy initiatives and show where we can all save energy and become friendly user of our valuable resources for life.

For somebody like myself with no background in energy poverty, I thought poverty only hit humans in the more well documented forms - of food, housing, finance and health – and as such was eager to learn from the experts. But it soon became clear to me that in an increasingly industrialised world, a lack of access to energy – energy poverty – is increasingly a big problem for the world’s poorest.

The question which came to me was: what are the consequences of energy poverty compared with absolute poverty humans suffer from? What are the scales of both of them? If we are truly serious about eradicating poverty, then where does the need for energy sit in the big picture? The most important conclusion was that we need to transfer our technology to the poor countries, rather than export our product. Many emerging economies are based on reverse engineering and copying technologies. The new patent laws which have emerged in recent years have safeguarded the inventors, but often put a stranglehold on poor nations who have no chance to develop their industries.

Exporting our technology to poor countries might provide a short term solution, but when we leave, we take the technology with us. Only technology transfer enables poor communities to build social industry which in turn will enable them to be financially independent in the long term. Our Corporate Social Responsibility to them should not only be a financial contribution, but should be the sharing of our technology to build the industrial social fabric of their societies. This should not only be used for energy but for any field in which we can empower people by the technology we have.

There has to be positive technology transfer and skillshare, not just moving the factory to poorer countries, without safeguards or proper partnership. There must be gatekeepers: Government, civil society, local businesses, INGOs and CSR can help to ensure that technology transfer is effective and sustainable.

Our advances in technology and energy research should be used to train, empower and build capacity – all too often they instead lead to exploitation, ruin and societal disintegration.