Partnerships for Skill Development LCEDN Program
There is overwhelming evidence that access to modern energy forms is critical to development. The UN SDG 7 aims to ensure universal access to affordable, reliable and sustainable energy services by 2030. Access to clean energy improves living standards, improves economic opportunity, and can contribute to better health, education and overall wellbeing. Despite these benefits, many regions of the world, including India, experience high levels of energy poverty and inequitable access to clean energy resources. In response, large numbers of government mandates, civil society groups, industries and research organisations have committed to developing and researching clean energy solutions.
In India, women and girls are often the primary producers and users of household energy, but there has been a lack of dialogue about the ways in which energy poverty impacts women, and the role of energy access programmes in facilitating empowerment in line with UN SDG 5. On this background, IRADe along with TERI and MSSRF, in partnership with ENERGIA started a series of workshop to be held in Delhi, Chennai and Bangalore. The workshop aims to directly address these topics, with the goal of providing a platform for conversation on the household energy-empowerment nexus to national and international participants working in the field of gender and energy sectors. It will facilitate opportunities for discussion between participants in understanding how clean energy programmes impact the welfare, productivity and empowerment of women and girls within low-income households in India. In bringing together a diverse range of participants, the workshop aims to contribute to building a network of gender and energy in India, on a cross-disciplinary platform to learn.