Productive Use 2.0
Why are we ignoring the most powerful productive tool on Earth?
Every few months, leading energy organizations such as GOGLA, the World Bank, and the Efficiency for Access Coalition release reports celebrating progress in solar access and off-grid innovation. These highlight impressive growth in solar lanterns, home systems, and productive use appliances like solar water pumps and refrigerators.
These are vital tools. They help farmers increase yields, small shop owners sell cold drinks and families live more comfortably. This is the foundation for some economic development. But as we celebrate these milestones, we must also address a glaring omission: In an office in New York, London or Tokyo, the number one tool of productivity isn't a water pump - it's a computer. Yet, in the reports defining the future of economic activity for hundreds of millions in Africa and Asia, laptops and computers are close to invisible.
This isn't just an oversight; it's a critical blind spot that threatens to inadvertently trap the next generation in an analog past rather than empowering them to build a digital future. Nearly 70% of the population in Sub-Saharan Africa is under the age of 30. This is a generation that grew up with smartphones. Their aspirations are inherently digital.
Consumption vs. Production
A smartphone has connected the world, but it's a tool for participation, not production.
Smarthone vs. Computer
Smartphones have only solved the digital access problem. A phone is perfect for communication, mobile money, booking a hotel or flight and consuming content. But let us be real - it is not a tool for real productive work. A phone is for participating in the digital world - a computer is for building it.
The digital revolution that transformed the economies of the US, EU and Asia wasn't built on messaging apps - it was built on computers with comfortable user interfaces, real processing power and complex software applications. To exclude the primary tool for the modern knowledge economy from our definition of 'productive use' is to tell the world's next emerging economies that their productive potential ends at the farm gate or the small shop front.
Introducing Productive Use 2.0
It's time to evolve the narrative. We must move from an exclusive focus on powering tangible assets to a vision that empowers the human potential, talent and bridging the digital divide.
Productive Use 1.0
Powering tangible assets for immediate, local income.
- Solar Water Pumps
- Refrigerators
- Agro-processing
- Small Shop Tools
Productive Use 2.0
Empowering human potential for the global digital knowledge economy.
- Laptops & Computers
- Digital Infrastructure for Connectivity & Data Processing
- Digital Capacity Building
- Remote Digital Work
The Economic Opportunity
By focusing only on Productive Use 1.0, the sector risks overlooking an exponential source of economic growth. The ROI of enabling a single remote software developer, designer, or data worker can far exceed that of selling traditional PUA assets. The next frontier of productive use is not limited by geography — it’s defined by connectivity, creativity, and computation.
Annual Income Potential
A CALL TO ACTION
The transition to Productive Use 2.0 is already underway. Reports from the World Bank and other development partners highlight the growing need to expand energy access beyond consumption toward productive digital empowerment.
At IONA, we believe solar-powered computing is the bridge between off-grid energy and the global digital economy. Our solar solutions are designed to bring digital entrepreneurship, education, and opportunity directly to the communities that need them most.
However, the transition to Productive Use 2.0 cannot be achieved by technology alone. As the World Bank's report on 'Accelerating the Productive Use of Electricity' makes clear, success for any productive use appliance hinges on a complex ecosystem of support - built on five interconnected 'building blocks': planning, policy and regulations, finance, technology, and market/business development. This means moving beyond simply providing a device.
Planning must involve mapping digital literacy rates and identifying regions with reliable connectivity. Policy and regulation must evolve to include incentives for digital capacity-building and reduce import tariffs on computing hardware, not just solar components. Innovative finance models, perhaps linking RBF outcomes to job creation in the digital economy, are needed to de-risk investments for importers, distributors and end-users. Equally crucial, market and business development must forge partnerships to connect trained users with digital work opportunities and build the local support required to maintain the hardware. Without this holistic, ecosystem-first approach, even the most powerful productive tool on Earth risks becoming just another isolated solution, failing to catalyze the broad, sustainable economic transformation that our off-grid communities deserve.
