Households require energy for the essential services of cooking food, heating water, space heating and illumination in order to satisfy basic human needs. Lack of choice in accessing adequate, reliable and safe energy services to sustain economic and human development is the way in which energy poverty manifests. Despite many pro-poor policies and strategies, and despite an impressive electrification and housing programme since 1994, the country is still faced with many challenges around energy poverty.

Under this theme, SEA supports cities to better understand the challenges around energy service delivery, builds capacity, supports improved data tracking and tackle some of the regulatory challenges that impact on energy poverty. In addition our work has included policy analysis and recommendations for government on how to better tackle energy poverty stakeholder engagement.