One West African firm is focused on small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), and it has led to huge returns. SMEFunds, a non-profit organization led by entrepreneurs, promotes the creation of “sustainable new, small business ventures” and has recently been recognized as one of the leaders in Africa’s clean energy sector and overall winner at the West Africa Forum for Clean Energy Financing (WAFCEF).
The project that helped edge out its competitors was Nigeria’s Green Energy & Biofuels in which SMEFunds provided new technology. The first phase cost around $28 million which will go toward increasing ethanol cooking gel production and clean cookstove manufacturing. The company said in a release that already one million liters of cooking gel had been produced locally using the 2G Cellulosic Bio-Ethanol technology from wastes like water hyacinth and saw dust. SMEFunds has over 15,000 entrepreneurs through its Carbon Credit Network that helped initiate the business to sell cooking gel and stoves across West Africa. The organization’s CEO Femi Oye, in an interview with the National Mirror, which its projects have created around 45,000 jobs in which women make up 60% of that figure. Oye said, “It is gratifying to note that within two years that the project came on stream, it attracted a lot of attentions because it was designed and developed by the people and for the people.”
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