DRE Innovations for Powering Rural Livelihoods

With the Indian Government’s focus on providing universal access to electricity, the decentralized renewable energy (DRE) sector has anticipated opportunities in the livelihood and productive applications space, among others, to support growth in the coming years. The gap in reliable supply has led to the emergence of a market for DRE powered livelihood applications.

Reliable electricity supply is one of the major barriers being faced by rural micro-enterprises. Intermittent electricity supply has a negative impact on productivity, which translates into lower revenue generation for the enterprise. These enterprises have limited dispensable capital to spend on expensive alternatives such as diesel which may be more reliable. However, given the high input of these alternatives, they are often unable to make up for the revenue losses due to unreliable electricity and low productivity. Adequate, reliable, and affordable energy can strengthen existing rural livelihoods and create new ones.

The rural economy is broadly divided into two sectors: those whose primary income comes from agriculture (the farm sector), and those whose livelihoods depend on work other than agriculture (the non-farm sector). While agriculture has remained the primary source of income for most of rural India, non-farm employment has grown significantly over the past decade. Further, as productivity improves in the farm sector, people moving away from agriculture will seek employment opportunities in the non-farm sector. This will increase the need to expand and support livelihood opportunities in the non-farm sector. As mentioned above, reliability and in some cases, access still remain key barriers.

In depth details of these innovations and technologies can be found in CLEAN’s Compendium of DRE Technologies (First Edition, 2020) .

Case studies

Solar Powered Rice Hullers

Hulling of rice requires machinery and a substantial amount of energy both of which small scale farmers do not have access to due to availability or reliability issues. This means that they undertake the laborious task of manual hulling or travel long distances to the nearest rice mill. These mills are usually too expensive for the small-scale farmers and result in increased costs for them and lower incomes.

Alto Precision has innovated a portable solar rice huller in order to tackle this challenge. The huller consists of 2-4 solar panels 250Wp. The huller can simply be plugged in and used. The gap between the rollers is also adjustable from 0.1mm to 1mm for processing different types of rice. The pressure of the huller can also be adjusted.

Solar powered rice huller offers a solution to farmers. They can be brought by individual farmers or farmer groups and eliminate the need to travel expensive far off mills. They will reduce drudgery and increase productivity at a cost-effective price.

Solar Powered Refrigerators

Small-scale enterprises operating in areas with unreliable or no access to electricity have an unmet need of cooling appliances. There is a requirement of appliances which can ensure freshness of dairy, poultry, and meat products with unreliable or no electricity available.

Solar refrigerators offer a viable solution for these small-scale enterprises. Based on the requirements, different capacity fridges can be used ranging from 100 liters to 240 liters. These fridges function on a relatively low wattage and consume power as low as 0.1KWh per day.

The addition of solar DC fridges in small-scale enterprises will enable them to maximise their sales and profits, and result in a significant increase in income.

Dharma Life Creating Micro-Entrepreneurs

Dharma Life through its unique entrepreneurship model provides people with potential the opportunity to earn a livelihood while driving change in their villages. These Dharma Life Entrepreneurs earn by conducting behaviour change activities in their communities. Moreover, they also earn by selling products of progress like solar lamps, water purifiers, induction cookstoves to name a few.

Dharma recruits’ people with basic education, who are in need of money and don’t have a full-time job. We typically recruit subsistence farmers and women. Dharma imparts sales training to its recruits. They earn a monthly income between Rs 2,000 and Rs 8,000 depending on their sales. Dharma provides its recruits products that address rural needs. It sources these products from retail, FMCG and social enterprise companies. It then ships them to distribution points in a district where a local distributor (chosen by the company) and an enterprise leader (on the company’s payroll) ensure that the goods reach the local entrepreneurs.

If a product fails to find traction among villagers, the entrepreneur returns the unsold items to Dharma, which bears the loss. To counter such failures—and there have been some in the past—the company has a mentoring programme: Every week, an enterprise leader in the district visits members of his / her team to get feedback. It also conducts awareness drives.