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As world leaders and most influential business people met in Davos (World Economic Forum) to discuss how to solve the global financial crisis, there was a special session on Africa (Governance and aid). The discussion was on Politics, poverty and how things can be changed there in Africa. People poured in amazing ideas and everybody owed to do more for the betterment of Africa. And at the end of it there was usual clapping and shaking, everybody seemed pretty happy.
However, what really surprised me that no one talked about Energy poverty in Africa. You may ask what is this energy poverty in the first place? According to me "not having basic access to energy (be it in any form) is energy poverty" i.e. lighting a bulb in home to having access to fuel to burn stove in the kitchen. These are very basic yet essential needs for anybody's survival which we the people living in west take it for granted. One can ask here why is it more important to talk about energy poverty when people don't even have enough food to eat? But my argument for exactly reason we should talk about it. What is the core problem in Africa? Is it people are really hungry and world just can't produce enough food to feed them ? Nope, the problem is they (Africans) themselves can't produce enough food to feed themselves. Adding to this problem bad governance, war, corruption, etc., are not helping either. Feeding free food help them escape hunger for the day but thats no way for the permanent and sustainable development. I think world will a better place and Africa will be a better place if we start talking about energy poverty and create sustainable solutions for energy poverty.
Having said that let me present some of the other problems and hypocrisies without risking myself sounding Anti-American all over again unlike in my last blog. Here are some basic questions we rarely see being asked in the media. "Why is that entire world just watched and did nothing when Mr.Mugabe was stealing the elections publicly in Zimbabwe? Why didn't any western country used any meaningful diplomatic tool to deliver the justice to Zimbabwean people?" The simple answer lies in the fact that Zimbabwean has no meaningful natural resources that World can benefit from. Would it has been same if Zimbabwe is some oil rich country. Would the world then wait to see Zimbabwean economy collapse with inflation at 2000% and elections stolen openly? Perhaps not. Neither those big corporations nor those governments wait to see that happen. May be I'm wrong to raise such an issue having seen what happened in Nigeria. But see my friends, Oil and gas was not that costly then?? Nigeria mysteriously always does fine when the fuel prices are high.
The moral of the story is simple, I would want to see world invest in small and sustainable energy projects in Africa apart from supplying food and water, etc. Energy is as essential as it is food. But profitability is the question of the day for business community. Will it be a profitable investment? How does the cost benefit analysis look like? Nothing look positive for projects like these and will never look positive. Thats why I call for ethical solutions not profitable solutions. Just consider it as delivering any other aid to Africa and change the face of earth in the night time..confused ... look at the above picture for the answers...how dark Africa is and can't we bring some light !!
Sree
