SPARKNET Bibliography

Author and Title	Cecelski, Elizabeth W., "Gender and Poverty Challenges in Scaling up Rural Electricity Access"
Article in	Paper presented at: Village Power '98: Scaling up Electricity Access for Sustainable Rural Development, World Bank, Washington DC, October 1998
Available online at
End use	Household energy
Energy technology	Decentralised energy
Issue	Energy & poverty; financial access to energy (micro-credit); reducing women's workload
Level	Research
Description	After a short introduction of sustainable rural energy development and the 1990s global energy agenda, the author describes and analyses the relation between gender and poverty and how sustainable rural energy development is linked to these issues. The link between rural electrification and poverty alleviation can be seen, for example, when micro-credit programmes give women access to electricity. The main source of energy in poor rural households is women's labour, therefore, concludes the author, the real energy crisis is women's time. The large number of female-headed households, which are often poorer and thus more vulnerable for energy scarcity, proves the strong gender bias of energy and poverty in rural areas. It also needs to be taken into considerations that women and men have different needs and so their uses of electricity also differ. The paper lists which high priority needs of rural women could be met by electricity and give some recommendations on gender and village power.

This bibliography item provided with financial support of the Department for International Development of the UK Government (DFID) and ENERGIA International Network on Gender and Sustainable Energy