Slow pace of implementation of conventional rural electrification

The technical merits of a grid supply, as well as the consumer benefits it brings, are evident. Equally obvious is the greatest limitation of the approach: The overall rate at which it is taking place is barely keeping pace with population growth.

Table 3.4 shows World Bank figures for population and rural electrification in the developing world between 1970 and 1990. Although it can be seen that the proportion of the rural population with an electricity supply has increased from 18 percent to 33 percent, the total numbers without a supply are just as great in 1990 as they were in 1970. Thus, despite major rural electrification efforts, and despite significant progress, hundreds of millions of rural people face only the remotest prospects of obtaining an electricity supply within the next decade or more.

Major variations can be found within these global totals, however. Table 3.5 shows that in a number of Asian countries - such as Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, and China - rural electrification has reached an advanced stage. For most of the other countries listed, the proportion of rural people connected is much lower. In India, for example, although massive rural electrification investments have been made since the early 1970s, and about 80 percent of villages have been connected to the grid, the proportion of households with a supply is just 22 percent. In Bangladesh, which also has made major investments in its rural electrification program, the proportion of connected households is still only about 5 percent (the foreign exchange already invested or committed to the rural electrification program in 1988 amounted to about $378 million).

Table 3.4 Rural Electrification and Population Data (millions)

Population	1970	1980	1990
World	3,635	4,428	5,267
Developing country	2,543	3,185	3,919
Developing country, rural	1,929	2,287	2,482
Percentage with electricity supply, rural	18	25	33
Number with electricity supply	340	573	807
Number without electricity supply	1,589	1,715	1,663

Source: IENPD (1995).

Table 3.5 Proportion of Rural Families with an Electricity Supply, Selected Countries

Country	Year	Rural population electrified (percentage)
Asia
Bangladesh	1988	5
China	1990	78
India	1988	22
Indonesia	1990	21
Malaysia	1990	80
Philippines	1993	51
Sri Lanka	1988	25
Thailand	1990	72
Latin America
Costa Rica	1986	74
North Africa
Jordan	1985	82
Morocco	1987	14
Yemen	1986	5

Source: Meunier (1993).

Even in countries with high levels of rural electrification, the absolute numbers without a supply are large. In Thailand, for example, some 1,000 to 1,500 villages are officially recognized as being outside the scope of the country's rural electrification program because of their remoteness or inaccessibility. In the Philippines, 51 percent of the rural population have a supply, which means that some 18 million rural dwellers do not. In the western provinces of China, with a population of 100 million, some 25 million are not expected to receive grid electricity even in the long term.

In most of Sub-Saharan Africa, rural electrification is at an early stage. The rural electrification efforts of the national electricity utilities in most countries are almost entirely concentrated on supplying provincial towns, where connection rates are usually 10 to 15 percent. Electricity supplies for small villages or individual rural households in these countries are not even under consideration. The ambitious national rural electrification program in Ethiopia, if implemented, would bring supplies to about 4 percent of the rural population by the year 2011. Similarly, a seminar on rural electrification in Mozambique, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe found that rural electrification was virtually at a standstill in all four countries because of lack of funding (SKI 1993). Worse still, in some cases - The Gambia, for example - lack of funds has meant that rather than expanding, the existing rural supply system has been deteriorating and effectively contracting.