SD Strategies contributed research, writing and analysis to this report by Practical Action and E3Analytics for SEforAll. We present evidence on how enterprises delivering electricity access and clean cooking are being financed, based on analysis of five high-impact countries: Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Kenya, Myanmar and Nigeria.

While many studies have estimated amounts of investment needed to meet energy access goals, none have attempted to systematically capture what developing countries are committing to on energy access and, most importantly, how much is going to decentralized energy access solutions. This study fills precisely this gap.

One of the biggest takeaways from the paper is that that overall finance flows are way too low and that enterprises themselves, while still growing and sometimes thriving, face complex financing challenges that differ widely from country to country, with varying levels of debt, equity and grant funding needs. Unique lessons are found through the examination of the five high-impact countries investigated, and specific recommendations are offered for elevating finance levels – including steps that will make it easier for enterprises to access capital more readily and at reasonable costs – with the aim of making significant progress in global electricity and clean cooking access rates.