On Friday 15 April 2022, the Mauritius Renewable Energy Agency (MARENA) and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) have facilitated an award ceremony for women recently trained in entrepreneurship and the basics of photovoltaic (PV) technology. This symbolic event was held in the presence of several personalities including Mrs. Kobita Jugnauth, spouse of the Prime Minister of Mauritius; representatives of several ministries and of the UNDP, and women entrepreneurs.

The UNDP Mauritius Country Office is supporting the Mauritius Renewable Energy Agency (MARENA) in the promotion and development of Renewable Energy (RE) under the Green Climate Fund (GCF) project entitled “Accelerating the transformational shift to a low-carbon economy in the Republic of Mauritius”. This partnership involves collaboration with several ministries and parastatal bodies to ensure a training programme on entrepreneurship and the basics of PV  for women holding micro-enterprises. These training sessions which were also supported by the Clinton Climate Initiative under the Clinton Foundation were launched in October 2020, and have benefited 192 participants (including 175 women and 17 men).

During the event, Mrs. Kobita Jugnauth expressed her gratitude to the UNDP country office “for helping Mauritius to lay the foundations for electricity generation from Renewable Energy at a national scale”. She also mentioned the precious collaboration of the Clinton Foundation, which has allowed to support various local public institutions for raising awareness on RE at grassroots level. Mrs. Kobita Jugnauth also congratulated MARENA for its contribution and highlighted that she was pleased to see that many women entrepreneurs had benefited from training sessions that will allow them to develop further, potentially through the use of RE.

Present during the ceremony, the Honourable Georges Pierre Lesjongard, Minister of Energy and Public Utilities, congratulated the awardees stating that it is “encouraging to see women’s increasing interest in the energy sector, which has, for long, been a male-dominated one”. Minister Lesjongard added that Mauritius is short of many natural resources but is endowed with sunlight, sea, and wind energy, which are solutions for green energy production and for the economy at large. The Honourable Georges Pierre Lesjongard also highlighted that it should be “every Mauritian’s dream that Mauritius becomes greener by producing clean energy”.

The Honourable Kalpana Devi Koonjoo-Shah​, Minister of Gender Equality and Family Welfare​, acknowledged that the contributions of MARENA and the UNDP to drive more women towards Renewable Energy were aligned with the policy of her ministry concerning women empowerment. Minister Koonjoo-Shah also expressed the wish “to see more women engineers in the RE sector.”

“Ensuring access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all”

Ms. Amanda Serumaga, UNDP Resident Representative for Mauritius and Seychelles, congratulated the awardees for their successful completion of the training and highlighted the benefits of an integrated approach to complex development challenges and long-term market demands. The UNDP Resident Representative stressed that “this training enabled working towards SDG 5 on “Gender Equality”; SDG 7 on “Ensuring access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all”, focusing on women, youth, and local and marginalised communities; and on SDG 13, “Taking urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts”.

Ms. Mreedula Mungra, and Mr. Danen Beemadoo, respectively Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of MARENA, have emphasised the ambition of Mauritius to reach 60% of RE on the energy grid by 2030 and the efforts that this would involve, including installations for an additional 500 MWH. According to them, all the stakeholders of the energy sector must work together towards making RE a reality and a success story in Mauritius.