The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) is providing $1.5 million in funding to the French company Baobab+. The funds are intended for electrification via solar home systems in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC).

The former French colony gained independence in 1958 and became a major oil producer some two decades later. But little of this wealth has translated into prosperity for the country’s 5.5 million people – around half live in extreme poverty.

Since launching in 2021, Baobab+ is currently in the Kinshasa, Kwilu and Kikwit areas of the DRC and will soon enter Kwango. Baobab+ is in Côte d’Ivoire, Mali, Senegal, Madagascar, Nigeria and DRC and has equipped 250,000 households serving more than 1.5 million beneficiaries in the past six years.

Société sino-congolaise des mines (SICOMINES) will finance the construction of 18 drinking water supply systems in four localities in the province of Lualaba in the south of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The new pipelines will enable the company to improve access to drinking water for 8,000 people.

The International Finance Corporation (IFC) and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) have started works under the Scaling Mini-Grid (SMG) program, which was designed by the World Bank to improve electrification in the central African country.

Bboxx and the Government of (DRC have expanded their partnership to provide clean and affordable energy to millions of Congolese people. Under this extension, Bboxx will expand its clean energy services to the provinces of Kasai Central, Kasai, Kasai Oriental, Kwilu, Bas-Congo, Equateur and Kinshasa.