When the sun also produces electricity

L'Association Horonia, created in September 2003, is devoted both to persons in social and professional difficulty of the Nord-Pas-de-Calais region and to solidarity between the peoples of North and South. In 2008, the nonprofit set up an outreach grocery at Wattrelos, thereby serving more than two hundred families, providing answers to their needs, utilizing their knowhow through exchanges, and creating a social bond via workshops.

When they learned of the request of the Community Health Center of Médina Coura (CSCOM) in Bamako, Mali, Horonia decided to volunteer. The project involved the use of an electric power generation installation by photovoltaic collectors at the health center. This installation will stabilize and improve the quality of the energy, ensure better working conditions for the doctors, easier access to healthcare, and savings of €60 per month on the operating cost of the healthcare centre. At the same time, ten young Malians will be trained through workforce development in the installation and maintenance of the facility (a job is planned), some sixty persons will learn about the problems of energy at evening debates, and ten persons who benefit from the Wattrelos outreach grocery will have the opportunity to open up to the outside world by contributing to the completion of the project.

Another asset of the project, which is aimed in priority at the 9427 users of CSCOM, derives from the involvement of many local players of the NPD (involvement of a research engineer from the University of Lille, a doctor from Villeneuve-d'Ascq to improve the medical equipment, social centers, municipalities, etc.), from the technical exchanges between the local engineer and those of Croix, from the information and explanation campaigns aimed at the users on the subject of non-fossil renewable energies and on global warming, from the education of the users of the outreach grocery about the problems of the South countries, the opening of the Wattrelos beneficiaries to the outside world and, in general, the mobilization of the users of Horonia to carry out actions designed to contribute significantly to financing the project.

The Veolia Foundation has been approached to contribute to the financing of a valid project conducted with a spirit of solidarity between the peoples of the North and South.