Mosamba.com is officially in the running to be named the best 1st person, personal account, Kiva Fellows blog in the blogsphere. Through a lengthy process my friend Cissy and I have determined that our blogs are the two very best Fellows blog and are now ready to duke it out to determine which of our blogs is actually the undisputed BEST. The winner will be determined by the number of hits each blog receives. I usually start my day by looking at my blog metrics, taking screenshots and sending them to Cissy to keep her feeling insecure about her inferior numbers. However, this Cissy Deluca is scrappy and recently pulled close to even with me. We are both currently at around 1500 hits. From here on out this promises to be a heated battle that should primarily benefit you, the loyal mosamba.com reader, as I push to publish even more top notch content. So I call on you to bookmark mosamba.com, visit the site many times daily, email it to friends, tweet and retweet it and do what must be done to help us (the entire mosamba community) get this victory.

Update: I just finished integrating handy social media links into the blog. Now you will be able to share your favorite Mosamba posts on Facebook, Twitter, Digg etc with one click. Check the buttons out at the bottom of this post. I also optimized some backend processes that should make everything a bit more fun for everyone!

Thanks,

Cameron T. Morris

Chief Scribe/Mosamba.com

Observation: I already have something special planned for the day we reach 2000 hits. Let’s make it happen!

Solar Panel

Today I met with people from GTZ (Dutch-German Partnership Energising Development)  about a solar product that they are attempting to launch both here in Boane and in Matutuine in districts that are off the energy grid. There are two products 1) a solar lamp with built in radio ($40) 2) a larger battery unit that you can plug lights, cellphone chargers, radios, etc. into. ($100). While that price may seem cheap to you, it seems a bit expensive to me.  Let me tell you why.

GTZ wants to microfinance the purchase of these products with a loan term of 6 months. $40 is around MT 1200, so over 6 months you would be paying back principal of MT 200/month plus interest. A typical monthly energy bill for a Mozambican family is around MT 300-400. So in financing your solar lamp you’re almost paying the equivalent of an entire months energy bill while only getting one lamp. Won’t these people feel cheated, or do you think the marginal benefit of one unit of lighting is so great that it is worth making a payment almost equal to a monthly energy bill. Obviously after 6 months you don’t have to make any more payments, but the lamp is also only guaranteed for 6 months. And keep in mind that these people don’t otherwise have energy. So maybe I’m wrong?

If a solar panel can be produced for $2/watt and LED lamps can be run with 1 or 2 watts of energy shouldn’t a solar lamp products cost less than $10? Scientists?

VROOM, Vroom, vroom

Children of the motoway. They always get pretty excited when the moto arrives.