The electricity access index

Abstract

Two countries can report the same electricity access rate and yet face entirely different problems—one short of investment, another lacking a financeable business model and credible cost-recovery rules, a third needing only the political decision to allocate an affordable cost across its consumer base. The access rate alone hides these differences, and so do the electrification plans built on it. The Electricity Access Index (EAI) is a country-level diagnostic designed to expose them: it assesses whether the current electrification effort, and the policies and regulations under which it is deployed, are adequate to a financeable path to universal access. Applied to four contrasting cases—Rwanda, Malawi, Bangladesh, and Ecuador—it shows that countries fall behind for very different reasons even when they pursue the same goal. Some face a demanding but financeable scale-up. Some combine an investment gap with weak business models and limited regulatory credibility. Others are close to universal access and can readily finance the last mile through internal cross-subsidies, but lack the political commitment to decide how that cost is recovered. By making these differences explicit, the EAI shifts the assessment from how many people are connected to the binding constraint on delivery in each case.

Two countries can report the same electricity access rate and yet face entirely different problems—one short of investment, another lacking a financeable business model and credible cost-recovery rules, a third needing only the political decision to allocate an affordable cost across its consumer base. The access rate alone hides these differences, and so do the electrification plans built on it. The Electricity Access Index (EAI) is a country-level diagnostic designed to expose them: it assesses whether the current electrification effort, and the policies and regulations under which it is deployed, are adequate to a financeable path to universal access. Applied to four contrasting cases—Rwanda, Malawi, Bangladesh, and Ecuador—it shows that countries fall behind for very different reasons even when they pursue the same goal. Some face a demanding but financeable scale-up. Some combine an investment gap with weak business models and limited regulatory credibility. Others are close to universal access and can readily finance the last mile through internal cross-subsidies, but lack the political commitment to decide how that cost is recovered. By making these differences explicit, the EAI shifts the assessment from how many people are connected to the binding constraint on delivery in each case.