This year reaffirmed the importance of focusing on issues central to our region: energy transitions, urban development, agrifood systems and technology management. Across all these domains, our themes of resilience, inclusion, frugality, governance and informality have remained our compass.
Systems-based approaches are gaining traction as a way to integrate socio-political, socioeconomic, and techno-economic considerations and enable collaborative and fair practices in sustainable transitions
Amidst the prevalence of energy poverty in sub-Saharan Africa, mini grids have emerged in recent years as a promising solution, not only to bridge lingering electricity access gaps, but also to revitalise rural economies.
This perspective presents guidelines, developed through a collaborative process informed by a scoping literature review and expert consultation with modelers and social scientists, for integrating GESI into large-scale energy and transport systems modeling processes, particularly in low- and lower middle-income countries.
In sub-Saharan Africa, Kenya is considered one of the frontier countries in developing long-term energy plans, locally known as Least Cost Power Development Plans (LCPDP). This paper scopes out how the 1) actors, interests and power dynamics, 2) the institutions and policy, and 3) decision making and implementation practices underpinning the electricity sub-sector in Kenya shape the LCPDP processes.
This paper presents an indicator-based framework for the sustainability analysis of mini-grids and applies this to a selection of mini-grids in Kenya. Although various frameworks exist, they have been criticised for lack of attention to long-term perspectives, high data needs, prescriptive nature of the attributes and limited user-friendliness.
Public participation in all its forms is continually limited amongst the marginalized, especially those living in informal settlements. While the right to participate in decision-making on policy and development projects is enshrined in state laws, the urban poor continue to be excluded from such activities, thereby limiting their democratic rights. Inadequate public spaces are one factor that minimalizes the urban community’s participation in citywide proposals.
This report is the output of the Kenya National eCooking Study (KNeCS) which analyses the status of electric cooking in Kenya with the view of supporting the development of the Kenya National eCooking Strategy aimed at accelerating the adoption of electricity as a cooking fuel. This study examines the state of household electrification and access to eCooking in Kenya based on primary and secondary collected between December 2022 and April 2023.
The report evaluates the potential for adopting electric cooking (eCooking) among households and food businesses in Nairobi’s informal settlements, particularly Mathare. Using household surveys, cooking diaries, market mapping, vendor interviews, and appliance testing (notably electric pressure cookers), it explores existing cooking practices, electricity access (formal vs informal), barriers like cost, safety, and awareness, and market constraints.
This report provides a clear and accessible overview of the multi-stakeholder workshop that was held on 28th of March 2025 in Nairobi. The workshop was organized by Nuvoni Centre for Research, Leiden Delft Erasmus universities (Netherlands) and the Circular Community Foundation and funded by LDE Global.
This document details the modelling approaches and findings used to inform the interventions within the eCooking Strategy. It utilises data collected during the KNeCS Baseline Study (2023), and is designed to explore key research questions that have emerged during the strategy development process.
This proposal provides a comprehensive description of the form and design that digital hubs should adopt in Mathare informal settlement. The case is built following a critical analysis of the findings of the study on “Digital employment and training centres in informal in settlements’ piloted in Mathare.
The Digital Hubs co-creation workshop was conducted on 18th June 2024 at the Golden Tulip Hotel in Westlands, Nairobi. It was hosted by Nuvoni Centre for Innovation Research (NCIR).
This policy paper offers a step-by-step approach to co-create digital hubs in informal settlements, gain trust in the process and adjust their governance and activities to the local context.
This paper offers a literature review to describe the existing knowledge on digital hubs in informal settlements. It aims to offer a practical guide on how to co-create digital employment hubs, questioning what problems they address, what their objectives are, and what activities, and governance structures they employ.
Africa is urbanizing at an unprecedented rate, presenting unique challenges in managing and planning for urban development. This article by Beatrice Hati Gitundu and Alice Menya emphasizes that continuing with conventional planning approaches, which have historically reproduced marginalization, is no longer tenable.
This paper offers a literature review to describe the existing knowledge on digital hubs in informal settlements. It aims to offer a practical guide on how to co-create digital employment hubs, questioning what problems they address, what their objectives are, and what activities, and governance structures they employ.
This paper by Dr Elsie K. Onsongo, Prof. dr. Peter Knorringa and Prof. dr. Cees van Beers investigates how a multinational enterprise (MNE) engages in frugal business model innovation to find the optimal balance between value creation and value capture in resource-constrained contexts in sub-Saharan Africa.
This paper provides a first attempt to map several characteristics of Tanzania’s e-cooking socio-technical innovation system. The ‘map’ consists of visualisations of the actor-networks and actor-relations in the system along with elaborations on who the actors are, the extent and nature of their interactions, sketches of significant projects, and discussion of emerging issues relevant to the further development of the innovation system.
This paper discusses in relation to four countries in sub-Saharan Africa: Kenya, Tanzania, Nigeria and Senegal, in recent years new private sector actors in renewable energy mini grids have started to emerge, marking a shift away from large-scale diesel or hydro mini grids run by government utilities, and small-scale mini grid development previously led by bi-lateral donors and community organisations on a project-by-project basis.
his paper sheds light on two main concepts applied to innovation for development: frugal innovation and inclusive innovation. Researchers often conflate these concepts when classifying or characterizing innovative endeavours in developing contexts. We argue, however, that these concepts are fundamentally different based on their philosophical orientations or logics, i.e. frugality versus social inclusion, their respective innovation processes and outcomes.
This paper provides a first attempt to map several characteristics of Kenya’s e-cooking socio-technical innovation system. The ‘map’ consists of visualisations of the actor-networks and actor-relations in the system along with elaborations on who the actors are, the extent and nature of their interactions, sketches of significant projects, and discussion of emerging issues relevant to the further development of the innovation system.
The paper makes four contributions. First, it tests the extent to which the STIS-building concept is useful in understanding and conceptualising how Lighting Africa transformed the market for solar lanterns in Kenya from an estimated market size of 29,000 lamps in 2009 to one where 680,000 Lighting Africa certified lamps were sold in Kenya by the end of the Programme in 2013. Second, it presents the most in-depth analysis of Lighting Africa that we are aware of to date.
This paper provides a first attempt to map several characteristics of Rwanda’s e-cooking STIS. The ‘map’ consists of visualisations of the actor-networks and actor-relations in the system along with elaborations on who the actors are, the extent and nature of their interactions, sketches of significant projects, and discussion of emerging issues relevant to the further development of the innovation system. It also includes some summary attention to the context and enabling environment of the e-cooking STIS.
This study explores the potential of mini grids as tools for inclusive innovation to address energy poverty in the Global South. We adopt the concept of inclusive innovation— which emphasizes the use of innovation to mitigate social exclusion and improve the well-being of marginalized populations—to systematically assess the literature on minigrids in the Global South. We explore the extent of inclusiveness in the aspiration, design, procurement, deployment and impact of mini-grids
This paper presents an indicator-based framework for the sustainability analysis of mini-grids and applies this to a selection of mini-grids in Kenya. Although various frameworks exist, they have been criticised for lack of attention to long-term perspectives, high data needs, prescriptive nature of the attributes and limited user-friendliness. Considering that data availability is a major concern and that data available is qualitative in nature, this paper proposes a set of indicators and a scoring system that can be used with a broad qualitative understanding of the sustainability attributes of the mini-grids.
The aim of our study was to interrogate the sustainability of mini grids in Kenya with a focus on their economic sustainability. We collect data using semi-structured interviews with households in 15 mini-grids across different geographical contexts in Kenya. We analyse energy use both for household and productive users, willingness to connect and willingness to pay for electricity, payment platforms and ease of access and use of these platforms, affordability, cost of electricity including that of connection, and interrogate the reliability of the electricity.
While community vitality is of increasing importance, it remains understudied. This study by Jan Fransen, Beatrice Hati, Rosebella Nyumba, Erwin van Tuijl explores community vitality in informal settlements by turning to the concept of frugal practices, defined as activities to develop and implement low-cost robust solutions that address communities’ needs within resource-constrained contexts. Based on literature and case study analysis in Nairobi, they define community vitality as dynamic relationships between residents and other local actors to cope with uncertainty and to meet community goals.
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