Reaching the poor

Abstract Many developing countries have subsidized provision or consumption of energy in an effort to reduce costs to un-served households. But many of these efforts have had the opposite effect—preventing business from promoting access to rural electricity by the poor. Businesses go after the subsidies rather than concentrating on the development of financially sound, rural energy service businesses. In this article, Douglas F. Barnes and Jonathan Halpern, of the UNDP/World Bank Energy Sector Management Assistance Programme (ESMAP) examine public policies for creating an enabling environment for promoting sustainable provision of decentralized modern energy services in rural areas.