Germanwatch and the High Atlas Foundation have the pleasure to invite you to a webinar on energy access, with a focus on Morocco and Africa more broadly. The webinar will be held on the 18th. September 2018 from 1 pm to 2 pm Central European Summer time on webex (12:00h Morocco time today). Please find thelink: https://meetings.webex.com/collabs/meetings/join?uuid=M06B6TO9JK67WSODHEMAW0QAPI-A3XN

Access to modern energy services is an essential pre-requisite for human development. Without energy, it is challenging, if not impossible, to promote economic growth, overcome poverty and expand employment opportunities. This has been recognized by the international community, with the Sustainable Goal 7 on “access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all”. Yet, more than 1 billion of people still do not have access to electricity today.

One of the continents where energy access is still lacking for many is Africa. But there are many positive stories as well: Morocco is one example of a country that is considered an energy transition pioneer. Despite the country’s well-known focus on large renewable energy projects, much progress has also been made on decentralized renewable energy access in some rural parts of Morocco.

In our discussions among NGOs, we frequently say that providing universal energy access should be a focus in the implementation of the Africa Renewable Energy Initiative (AREI. But what exactly do we mean by that? What should be our key demands as NGOs? And what are some examples of concrete approaches that AREI could support? We would like to use this webinar to discuss these questions with you, based on an overview of current energy access definitions and debates and a case-study on energy access in Morocco.

The webinar will begin with 2 presentations of 15 minutes each:
– Marine Pouget, Germanwatch: Is energy access only a question of “on/off”? What about the quality and affordability of energy?
– Yossef Ben-Meir, High Atlas Foundation Morocco: An Moroccan perspective on energy access: status quo, challenges and opportunity with energy decentralisation in Morocco
After the presentations, a 30 minutes discussion with the participants will be organised.

We hope you can join us!