Linking research to market with focus on private sector

There has always been a yawning need to use academic energy research to address the developing countries needs with particular example of Pakistan where the energy shortfall has shown its monster face. The lack of research relevance too shows the gap between research and creating products that poor people can actually buy. Commercializing products for use in requires input from key groups such as potential suppliers and poor consumers about what would be required to take a product to market. Launching a set of initiatives both from public and private sectors is direly needed in order to bring a practical energy solution to market. There has been an initiative from the private sector in Nigeria to introduce an inexpensive portable LPG cookstove especially for the poor class. This has been a successful experiment as the cookstove had promised to cut carbon emissions from people switching away from biomass cookstoves and from Oando selling gas. In Pakistan, most of the rural population cooks food by using high-priced kerosene and firewood, which create indoor air pollution – second only to poor water, sanitation and hygiene as a cause of death due to environmental factors. At a time when the country is bearing the brunt of poverty, a “business-as-usual” approach simply will not be enough to produce viable and cheap patterns needed to make substantial and sustainable inroads into energy sector. Though government has strong interest in fostering a business environment that enables the private sector to flourish especially in energy sector, there is still much more needed to popularize various affordable solutions to the energy sector for the poor populations. Public-private sector partnerships can be more instrumental in popularizing cheap and affordable energy solutions. Expanding market access to all private sector actors and improving how markets function can lead to such results in energy sector as more jobs, better returns on goods sold, greater affordability of essential goods and services and reduced exposure to risk. These outcomes influence the rate and pattern of economic growth. For growth to be “pro-poor”, the rate has to be high and sustainable and the pattern broad and inclusive. What is less clear, and merits further investigation, is how best to overcome resistance to change and bring about the institutional and policy reforms that will lead to more pro-poor market outcomes. Similarly, returns to the poor should increase through promotion of the use of technical standards, dissemination of technical and market information and provision of extension services through market-based approaches.