Panelists decry low advocacy of reliable and affordable energy 

Panelists at a capacity building workshop on the World Bank’s regulatory indicators for sustainable energy(rise) mechanism have decried the low advocacy of reliable and affordable energy.

For them, issues of environmentally sustainable and efficient energy systems for persons living in poverty were key to attaining SDG target 7 which sets out the global goal for universal access to energy services by 2030.

Organised by Alliance of Civil Society Organisation for Clean Energy (ACCESS)Ghana in collaboration with Strategic Youth Network Development (SYND) and Youth-REG, the training brought together CSOs working to deliver universal energy access by advocating at national and regional levels for transparent and inclusive multi-stakeholder participation at all stages of energy processes.

Similarly, to share knowledge and expertise across the membership base of practitioner experience in different regions.

In a presentation, Mr Ezekiel Chineze described the World Bank’s rise mechanism as a set of indicators to help compare national policy and regulatory frameworks for sustainable energy.

He said it assessed countries’ policy and regulatory support for each of the four pillars of sustainable energy-access to electricity, access to clean cooking, energy efficiency and renewable energy and has over 30 indicators covering 140 countries and representing over 98 per cent of the world population.

“Each indicator targets an element of the policy important to mobilising investment such as establishing planning processes and institutions, introducing dedicated incentives or support programmes and ensuring financially sound utilities” he stated.

He indicated that it could help national policy makers benchmark the energy sector framework against regional and global peers by classifying countries into green zone of strong performers in the top third of the 0-100 score range, a yellow zone of middle third performers and a red zone of weaker performers in the bottom third.

The pillars under rise he indicated were electricity access, clean cooking, renewable energy and energy efficiency.

Comparing Ghana to Senegal and Nigeria he said the over rating in 2022 indicated that Ghana was doing well than both countries in terms of the pillars however asked for more room for improvement.

BY BENEDICTA GYIMAAH FOLLEY