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Powering Livelihoods, an initiative of the Council on Energy, Environment and Water (CEEW), and Villgro Innovations Foundation has offered capital and technical support to six Indian enterprises that are working on clean energy-based livelihood solutions.
The solar powered livelihood solutions include water pumps, multi-purpose food processors, commercial refrigerators, and textile machinery (reeling, spinning and weaving) and fodder growing stations. The enterprises identified for support are Resham Sutra, Greenwear Fashion, Dharambir Food Processing, Khethworks, Devidayal Solar Solutions, and Hydrogreens Agri Solutions.
“The enterprises collectively have the potential to generate more than 10 lakh new livelihoods for women and men in rural India,” said a release from Powering Livelihoods.
Powering Livelihoods had around late June, offered a cumulative emergency funding of Rs 1 crore to the six selected enterprises to tide over the crisis posed by Covid-19.
Piyush Goyal, Union Minister for Commerce and industry and Minister of Railways, launched the Rs 22-crore initiative on Wednesday. Complimenting CEEW for its decade-long service to the nation, he said: “India is making rapid strides in the use of clean and renewable energy. We should look at leveraging technology and see how we can power livelihoods in villages. The collective work of innovators & start-ups, industry, and government will improve the livelihoods of people.”
Rajiv Kumar, Vice-Chairman, NITI Aayog, said, “over 3.5 crores micro entrepreneurs in rural India have huge potential to contribute to the country’s growth. Yet, they suffer due to certain constraints such as access to infrastructure and credit. Such initiatives would help address these constraints and ensure that our need for fossil fuels and its imports are considerably reduced.”
Powering Livelihoods is currently supported by IKEA Foundation, Shell Foundation (UK Registered Charity), DFID (UK Government), Good Energies Foundation and DOEN Foundation.
The initiative has also on-boarded 15 investors and financiers, including Acumen, Beyond Capital Fund, Caspian Debt, and Upaya Social Ventures.
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