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My idea is to help alleviate poverty in Pakistan and Empower Women with the help of renewable energy. I wish to supply Solar-powered cookers to the villages, which (as recorded in September in Khairpur) showed a minimum of Rs.200 savings/day including Rs.3/roti produced. Hence, the more the cooker was used and food produced, the more amount of savings there were. • These figures are only in terms of either buying wood or collecting wood (with respect to time and effort value of money). Gas cylinders were costing 235/day straight and were also a big safety hazard, leading to many unfortunate deaths due to explosions in the heat.
The women in the villages are unfortunately forced to stay at home and cook food. With the cooker, they can produce the food at very subsidised rates and earn revenue by selling them off to locals only. • The tea shops can use it to cook and constantly heat tea without paying for any energy bill; driving down their costs significantly and allowing them to increase profits whilst charging low prices. • Through both of these examples, I wish to promote entrepreneurship amongst the villagers who unfortunately are deprived of education. I wish to teach them how use their wit to earn money and educate themselves.
If I get funding for my project, I would do the following: • First, I will do is get in touch with the NGO that sponsored the cooker for Khairpur and tell them to prepare to distribute more cookers. • Second, I would figure out (depending on the amount of funding) how many cookers to supply and to which villages. • Third, I would get the people in the NGO to show and teach more people in the villages how to use it, so as to create a greater demand for the cookers. • Fourth, I would go to my supplier and sort out inventory. • Fifth, I would get the logistics sorted out of getting the cooker to Karachi Port and then to the villages with the help of the NGO. • Sixth, after delivering the cookers, I will have workshops, using earnings from the cookers as examples on what entrepreneurship is and how it can benefit the people.
Seventh, I, with the help of the NGO, will start to provide the cookers through a Microfinance Scheme, so as to show the people how to ‘catch the fish’ as opposed to just providing it to them. • Eighth, I would then stress on how important education is and how it can allow them to achieve such monetary goals. • Ninth, I, with the help of the NGO, will collect the payments of the Microfinance loans and using the concept as an example, teach them basic banking principals to aid them in any future business endeavor. • Tenth, whatever funds I will collect from the villagers, I shall re-invest in buying and supplying more Solar Cookers.