A Clean Solar Alternative to Kerosene Lamps, Nepal

Chepangs are one of the most underprivileged indigenous groups of Nepal. Their settlement areas lie far from development and people are compelled to lead hard lives.  Lothar VDC is one of those remote areas of Chitwan which acts as a home to over 5027 Nepalese people of whom 4000 are highly marginalized Chepang  people (Census 2011). The struggle has the civilization pushed back under margin of underdevelopment.

Lack of electricity is one of the major concerns in Lothar. It has affected series of socio-economic factors including education. To enhance child education by introducing Lothar community to efficient solar  technology, ECCA provided Solar Tuki sets, mass charging sets as well as maintenance training to 4 villages of Lothar namely Lo-ling, Gundi, Cheuding and Kalitar. Students, teachers and parents of 4 schools gathered on June 6, 2016. Each household received 2 solar tuki lamps benefitting 292 households in total, whereas mass charging stations (to charge the solar lamp) are kept at schools as an motivating agenda for school attendance. Thereby, students must come to school to charge their solar lamp.

Students and their parents were invited to receive Solar Tuki lamps

ECCA staff provides basic handling techniques of Solar Tuki

ECCA also provided 3 days long Solar tuki repair and maintenance training to 8 participants; 2 from each village. This will help them repair the lamps by themselves without having to travel far for its maintenance. These trained solar lamp repairing technicians will also be benefitting from the income received by repairing the solar lamps.

“Although people enroll their children at schools, only an average of 50% attend school regularly. Drop out rate is high and we believe that solar tuki can be a milestone to change this."

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