West Africa has some of the highest solar potential in the world. It also has an ever-growing demand for energy and a constantly evolving off-grid solar sector, and a rapidly-growing working age population (the average age being 19). In other words, off-grid solar is the perfect vehicle to sustainably drive job growth and positively impact the economic future of West Africa.
However, in order to ensure this job growth, we must help the workforce develop the skills the sector needs.
Off-grid solar companies as leading employers
From mini-grids and commercial and industrial (C&I) to solar home systems (SHS) and solar generators, off-grid solar is supplying energy for West African households, businesses, hospitals and schools. But off-grid solar doesn’t just power buildings, it powers livelihoods too.
According to GOGLA, the off-grid solar sector directly supported 370,000 full-time jobs worldwide in 2019, as well as a range of entry-level to management jobs across the value chain. In particular, the growth of off-grid solar’s last-mile pay-as-you-go (PAYGO) delivery model is a huge driver of rural employment and empowerment, creating decent jobs where there are limited opportunities, especially for women and vulnerable persons. For example, 55% of off-grid solar jobs are in rural areas and 27% are held by women.
These jobs come in many shapes and sizes, with wages usually above the national average. GOGLA research found that the most common roles are:
Sales and distribution (58%) - i.e. Field agents.
Installation and technical maintenance (18%) - i.e. Solar installers.
Management (11%) - i.e. Regional sales managers.
Customer support (8%) - i.e. Call centre support.
Acquisition, manufacturing and assembly (5%) - i.e. Factory workers.
Meanwhile, the West African off-grid solar industry also supports highly-skilled roles in areas such as marketing or accounting. At Oolu, we employ 216 people in West Africa in a wide range of roles, such as HR specialists, data analysts, solar engineers and operations managers.
However, as demand for solar products grows so does the demand for relevant skills, which are particularly hard to find in West Africa. So what steps or initiatives can be taken to upskill workers?
Upskilling workers is the key to success
A lack of appropriate high-level skills is a major obstacle to the continued growth of the off-grid sector in West Africa. For example, managerial or financial positions usually require university-level education, but just 9.4% of sub-Saharan Africa's population is enrolled in higher education. Meanwhile, only 2% of university graduates in Africa are engineers, which is a key skill set for the off-grid solar sector.
For off-grid solar, technical skills are the most difficult to find with few training schools providing the qualifications and experience required. Investing in human capital and helping the West African population upskill is essential. At Oolu, our way of supporting this type of growth is through our established regional training centres located in each of our countries of operation. These training centres help hundreds of previously unskilled rural agents and provide the necessary preparation for technical roles such as solar technicians and sales managers. In addition, we also hired and trained our in-house tech development team to create our proprietary Oolu Hub system for monitoring and reporting all our data.
Yet, despite some great success stories, here at Oolu - and the off-grid sector in general - we encounter a variety of hiring problems, especially with the length of time needed to find, hire, onboard, and train new staff.
What does the off-grid sector need?
More technical products require more technical roles. The development of the industry requires the development of the skills base. To make the most of this growing employment opportunity, support for relevant skills training is crucial.
West African governments have rightly made electrification a key priority for the next decade, so they should support this goal by helping prepare the workforce for off-grid solar jobs. At the secondary school level, this could be increased funding for technical skills or promoting the benefits of engineering. Governments could also provide support to adults that are eager to retrain for another role (but feel they don’t have the financial security to switch jobs) or partner with off-grid solar companies to create technical skills schools that can support the whole sector. Meanwhile, state employer agreements, such as financing 50% of new recruits’ salaries for the first two years for specific roles, would make a big difference.
From free evening skills classes to subsidised travel to training centres, there is a range of measures that can be employed to enhance relevant skills for both office-based and rural roles. The off-grid solar is already increasing job growth in West Africa, but it has the capacity to do so much more. It just needs a push in the right direction.