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Solar Powered Floating Schools |
Boat libraries visit remote villages in Bangladesh
(c) The Ashden Awards 2007
BANGLADESH- One of this year's Ashden Awards winners for Education, Shidhulai Sangstha, was rewarded for a project which makes the most of water as a way of bringing education and empowerment to remote communities. The organisation has designed a fleet of 88 locally-made wooden boats that bring a lifeline to the remote Chalanbeel region of Bangladesh. The boats use solar power to provide lighting and run computers and other equipment. They function as schools, libraries, internet hubs as well as information and advice centres, traveling up and down the rivers and across flooded fields to bring vital services to 400,000 people.
With limited road access, no electric grid and only basic sanitation, Chalanbeel is inhabited by some of the country's poorest and most margin alised communities. Few residents have enough land to support themselves and primary educa tion is hard to access, especially in the monsoon season when schools are often cut off by floods.
"If the children can't go to school," says the organisation's executive director, Abul Rezwan, "then the school can come to them."
Education and access to information have opened new doors for young and old alike. Solar powered internet and mobile facilities have helped people stay in touch with distant relatives and learn more about what is going on in the world. The boats use the latest in technology to link farmers directly with agricultural experts in universities across Bangladesh. Now, a farmer can hold up a diseased tomato in front of the webcam and a crop disease specialist can tell him what the problem is.
In the evenings, the boats use sail-like sheets as makeshift cinema screens to show agricultural training videos to villagers gathered on the river banks. The boats can also act as mobile power plants. Shidhulai has distributed 13,500 home solar systems and 2,500 solar lanterns in the Chalanbeel area, providing decent lighting - cheaper and cleaner than the smoky kerosene. Villagers can fish for longer and be safer at night; children can study better and adults can do craftworks such as weaving, so generating additional, valuable income, particularly for the women. "Due to climate change, over the next 20 years, 10 percent of our land will be lost to floods," says Abul Rezwan. "Issues like this need local solutions and local people need to be involved at every level."
With plans to increase the number of boats and train more local technicians, the Shidhulai project is an inspiring example of imaginative problem solving, where appropriate sustainable technology is clearly enriching people's lives.
The Ashden Awards, celebrate the very best in small scale, sustainable energy schemes in the developing world and UK.
Contacts:
www.ashdenawards.org
www.shidhulai.org
With limited road access, no electric grid and only basic sanitation, Chalanbeel is inhabited by some of the country's poorest and most margin alised communities. Few residents have enough land to support themselves and primary educa tion is hard to access, especially in the monsoon season when schools are often cut off by floods.
"If the children can't go to school," says the organisation's executive director, Abul Rezwan, "then the school can come to them."
Education and access to information have opened new doors for young and old alike. Solar powered internet and mobile facilities have helped people stay in touch with distant relatives and learn more about what is going on in the world. The boats use the latest in technology to link farmers directly with agricultural experts in universities across Bangladesh. Now, a farmer can hold up a diseased tomato in front of the webcam and a crop disease specialist can tell him what the problem is.
In the evenings, the boats use sail-like sheets as makeshift cinema screens to show agricultural training videos to villagers gathered on the river banks. The boats can also act as mobile power plants. Shidhulai has distributed 13,500 home solar systems and 2,500 solar lanterns in the Chalanbeel area, providing decent lighting - cheaper and cleaner than the smoky kerosene. Villagers can fish for longer and be safer at night; children can study better and adults can do craftworks such as weaving, so generating additional, valuable income, particularly for the women. "Due to climate change, over the next 20 years, 10 percent of our land will be lost to floods," says Abul Rezwan. "Issues like this need local solutions and local people need to be involved at every level."
With plans to increase the number of boats and train more local technicians, the Shidhulai project is an inspiring example of imaginative problem solving, where appropriate sustainable technology is clearly enriching people's lives.
The Ashden Awards, celebrate the very best in small scale, sustainable energy schemes in the developing world and UK.
Contacts:
www.ashdenawards.org
www.shidhulai.org
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