In 2007, an American NGO, the Solar Electric Light Fund (SELF), launched a project in Kalalé, Benin, to help electrify all 44 villages in the commune with solar power. Both the specific technologies involved and the project scale were unique, so SELF teamed up with the Center on Food Security and the Environment (FSE) to measure the impact of the project.

FSE, primarily led by FSE director Rosamond Naylor and FSE fellow Jennifer Burney, evaluated the livelihood and environmental impacts of using photovoltaic (PV) solar systems to power irrigation pumps for growing high-valued crops (solar market gardens). This work expands on the African Market Garden project pioneered by the International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT).

The team found that in less than a year the pumps increased household income and nutritional intake for participating women’s farming groups, and were a cost-competitive way of delivering much needed irrigation water, particularly during the long, dry season. 

FSE is now scaling the project up in a dozen new villages in Northern Benin and hopes to extend these systems into Niger. The goal is to create a regional market and learning center for the technology and farm products to be replicated in other areas of West Africa.

As the world struggles to cope with a changing climate, we hope that data from the work conducted here will help shape the debate on how best to promote environmentally-friendly development in the world’s poorest and most vulnerable nations.

This annotated photo gallery, and accompanying video gallery, is a product of a grant awarded by Stanford's Institute for Creativity and the Arts (SiCA) to FSE as part of a larger Arts and the Environment effort at Stanford. 

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