AETS, in cooperation with Energias de Portugal (EDP), was recently awarded a long-term technical assistance contract in Mozambique, namely: Promove Energia I: Energy Project Preparation Facility Resource Centre”. The 4-year project is funded by European Commission and will take place in Mozambique, a vast country with a population of 28.8 million people. Although Mozambique has taken considerable steps with regards to the country’s development indicators over the past 25 years, living standards continue to be relatively low, and in fact the country remains one of the poorest in the world and one of the lowest ranked in the Human Development Index (181 out of 188).
In terms of energy production and use, Mozambique produces the majority of its energy from biomass resources (charcoal and fuelwood). In relation to its electricity production, the country has a high generation capacity compared to its domestic consumption, given that currently only one third of the production is used nationally, with the other two thirds being sold to neighbouring countries. According to the country’s national energy company, only 26.6% of the population currently has access to the electricity grid.
In the Government’s Five-Year Plan (2015-2019) the government committed itself to increase, by 50%, the access to clean and affordable energy by 2020, while also committing itself to meeting the Universal Energy Access targets by 2030. In light of this, the European Union, along with 13 EU Member States and Norway, signed a joint declaration with the Government of Mozambique to increase cooperation in the Renewable Energy sector.
The above joint declaration, which was signed in 2016, is the basis for the current Promove Energia I project. The project, awarded to AETS and EDP, aims specifically to provide technical assistance to Mozambican public entities – notably, the Ministry for Mineral Resources and Energy (MIREME, Portuguese acronym), Energy Regulatory Authority (ARENE, Portuguese acronym), the state-owned energy company Electricidade de Moçambique (EDM), and the Mozambican Energy Fund (FUNAE, Portuguese acronym) – through the management of a resource centre which will provide capacity building activities and work towards enabling an environment for investment and project development. In more global terms, the project will seek to increase gender equitable access to sustainable and affordable renewable energy in rural areas.