Cameroon – Rural Electricity Access Project for Underserved Regions Project

The development objective of the Rural Electricity Access Project for Underserved Regions Project for Cameroon is to increase electricity access in underserved regions of Cameroon. The project comprises of five components.

The first component, rural electrification by grid extension consists of two sub-components: (i) rural electrification by extension of medium voltage and low voltage (MV and LV) networks; and (ii) reinforcements and extension of existing High Voltage Level B and High Voltage Level A and Low Voltage Level A (HTB and HTA and BTA) networks to enhance the security of power supply to new villages in far-north regions.

The second component, decentralized rural electrification is based on two concepts: (a) a public-private partnership (PPP) concept where the private sector, including energy of Cameroon (ENEO), will play a role as operator and not direct investor, and (b) securing supply of existing isolated mini-grids operated by ENEO in selected localities by hybridization, namely, adding photovoltaic (PV) solar mini-plants and extension of the existing HT and /BTA networks for better service coverage. It consists of two sub-components: (i) development of a pilot PPP for decentralized rural electrification; and (ii) securing the power supply of isolated sites by hybridization.

The third component, support to households for connection costs will support the establishment of a revolving fund to help finance initial household connection costs (including ready boards) to obtain grid supply in the 417 localities (targeted under sub-component 1.1 and component 2) and in approximately 12 localities that are already electrified.

The fourth component, strengthening institutional capacity of electricity sector and project management will support capacity building of implementing agencies and entities and project management.

It consists of six sub-components: (i) strengthening institutional capacity of the electricity sector; (ii) owner’s engineer for project supervision; (iii) structuring: (a) an industrial strategy built on rural electrification activities, and (b) local expertise for engineering, construction, and maintenance of HTA and BTA networks; (iv) income generation and capacity building for women and youth; (v) support to institutional reform of the rural electrification agency (AER); and (vi) project management support. The fifth component, contingent emergency response will be available if needed, to redeploy some of the project resources alongside those of other projects in the Cameroon project portfolio to respond to crisis and emergency needs.