Why did Bangladesh start a solar home system?

Rather than waiting for communities to connect to the national grid, the Bangladesh government began the Solar Home System (SHS) program, under the leadership of Infrastructure Development Company Ltd. (IDCOL), to mobilize the private and non-governmental sectors to find ways to rapidly bring clean electricity services to the people.

Does the World Bank support a solar home system?

The World Bank supported a Solar Home System (SHS) program, and public-private partnership, to build a thriving off-grid solar market. By 2018, the SHS program had sold over 4.1 million units, bringing electricity services to about 20 million people in Bangladesh.

How can Bangladesh's SHS program improve electricity access to other developing countries?

The Bangladesh SHS Program experiences offer useful lessons to scale up electricity access to other developing countries, including Sub-Saharan Africa with around 600 million people without access to electricity.

How did Bangladesh contribute to universal electricity access by 2021?

It laid the foundation for a whole new solar industry. The Bangladesh growth story has several elements, but central to it was contributing to universal electricity access by 2021. In early 2003, electricity access reached only 27 percent of the rural population in Bangladesh, and universal electricity access was estimated to take much longer.

How many people have been able to get electricity in Bangladesh?

By 2018, the SHS program had sold over 4.1 million units, bringing electricity services to about 20 million people. In 2013, sales peaked at 816,000 when 16 percent of the rural population was obtaining electricity through SHS. Today, Bangladesh has achieved near-universal access to electricity.

How does Bangladesh's SHS program work?

A new book, “Living in the Light – The Bangladesh SHS Story,” describes how the SHS program accelerated access to electricity to complement the country's development trajectory. It demonstrated that millions of dollars raised internationally can be loaned responsibly to remote and dispersed households in tranches as low as $100.