Special Report | By Olufikayo Owoeye
How Renewable Energy is Powering Africa’s Growth Energy is the key to development and the foundation for industrialisation. Considering Africa’s unparalleled potential for renewables, the continent’s starting point for the transformation of the energy sector is strong.
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lectricity supply in Africa is currently lagging considerably. Most people in Sub-Saharan Africa face severe energy deficit. Less than half of the population had access to electricity in 2018. Africa is well behind the rest of the world concerning the deployment of renewable energy. In 2018, only 20 percent of the electricity generated in Africa was from renewable sources. Compared with the rest of the world, investment is low. In 2019, twothirds of all newly added energy capacity for supplying electricity worldwide was based on renewable sources.
countries, supply lags grossly behind demand. For example, Nigeria, regarded as Africa’s biggest economy, has continued to battle power outages for decades despite spending billions of Dollars in foreign loans to improve the power situation. A recent World Bank report painted a heart-wrenching picture of power conditions in Nigeria.
The Bretton Woods institution said 85 million Nigerians do not have access to grid electricity -- this represents 43% percent of the country’s population - and makes Nigeria the country with the largest energy access deficit in the world. The Washington-based institution In recent times, Africa has seen rapid economic further said businesses in Nigeria lose growth, with a corresponding increase about $29bn annually because of unreliable in energy demand. Sadly, in most African electricity. 68 | Business Elites Africa / ISSUE 116
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