Project SolarPreneur
Under Project SolarPreneur we train underprivileged youths, women and young people, including refugees, in solar product making. And also equip them with green-skill, business development & market-linkage lessons.
Globally, Bangladesh is considered the market leader of solar home systems with 6 million household setups. However, these systems remain prohibitively expensive for a large portion of people from the river islands. Also, solar-powered products are not widely available in Bangladesh, production is really limited because of not having enough technically skilled people. That ends up not many companies venturing into the solar market. To address this problem, we started a grassroots livelihood initiative Project SolarPreneur in 2018, where we train underprivileged youths, women and young people, including refugees, in solar product making. And also equip them with green-skill, business development & market-linkage lessons. Sometimes we provide them with seed-funding to buy tools and start their own micro-enterprise to manufacture & sell solar lights and earn a livelihood.
Whoever turns into a micro-entrepreneur we call them SolarPreneur, and who just equipped themselves with green-skill we call them SolarEngineer. Our solar lamp-making training is allowing youths to have a sustainable livelihood. Which brings a huge workforce to the renewable energy sector. After the free training, we continuously support them strategically. So far, we have trained around 3000 rural people.
