2019 Scale-Up Partnerships in India Demonstrate Critical Progress

About

 Last month, stakeholders from the Sustainable Sourcing at Scale Partnership and the Energy Efficiency Alliance for Industry (E2 Alliance), both 2019 P4G Scale-Up Partnerships, welcomed P4G Head of Investments Sarbinder Singh to observe and co-strategize on their respective activities in India.

The Sustainable Sourcing at Scale partnership is implementing Verified Sourcing Areas (VSAs) in Andhra Pradesh, where more than 60% of the state’s inhabitants are involved in the agricultural sector.  Instead of certifying sustainable cultivation practices farm-by-farm, VSAs allow certifications to encompass larger geographical areas, which reduces costs for sustainable agriculture certification and allows markets to buy large scale volumes with greater efficiency, transparency and traceability, ultimately supporting Farmer-Producer Organisations (FPO). IDH – the sustainable trade initiative, the partnership lead, invited Singh to visit many of the farms where VSAs are being implemented.  Many of the crops produced at these locations included black pepper, coffee, cardamom – some of the world’s most highly-traded commodities.  Several farmers acknowledged that their involvement with the partnership has supported 15 to 20% increase in income, which directly translates to a 45 to 60% increase in the bottom line for farmers. Click here to watch a local farmer explaining these benefits.

With the E2 Alliance, Singh connected with partnership leaders from Energy Efficiency Services Ltd (EESL) and the Institute for Sustainable Communities (ISC) to learn about expansion opportunities for the partnership.  The E2 Alliance plans to contribute to decarbonization of the industrial sector by accelerating deployment of energy efficient motors.  The partnership’s expectation is to complete the deployment of 50,000 energy efficient motors in India over the next 6 to 8 months.

Singh commented, “The partnership is proving a commercial business model to accelerate the adoption of energy efficient motors in industry that can be replicated to deploy emerging energy efficient technologies and scaled in other economies in Asia and Africa.  The partnership has the potential to catalyze global south-south cooperation in energy efficiency.”

Given the progress that both partnerships demonstrated, the opportunity for financially sustainable business models in India is clear.  Ultimately, at the P4G Seoul Summit, these partnerships will share their successes and connect with leaders across sectors and industries to identify opportunities to scale their work, thus promoting approaches to clean energy and sustainable agriculture on the global scale.