Electrification and GDP
The Star Business report on April 16, states that an economist has said that the increase in electrification in Bangladesh will increase the GDP.
He says that if the country is self sufficient (with the whole country having electricity) in power, the GDP will increase by 26 percent in a year! Unfortunately, he does not indicate the parameters of total electrification; nor has he quantified the power requirement for this. However, the investment required for this additional generation, transmission and distribution of further (around) 5,000MW should satisfy most of our domestic, commercial and industrial needs. This will however involve monumental investment as well as a minimum time frame of about ten years for gestation .
Instead, we can start the process by encouraging the people to set up Voltic Solar Panels for power generation, to meet power needs for domestic, commercial, cottage and small industries for both urban and rural Bangladesh. The biggest advantage is that apart from the capital cost of installation and occasional battery upkeep; power will be free to the consumer! This process will require much less time. Given encouragement and support by the government, it will be possible to generate around 1000MW in say two years' time!
To achieve this, the government should remove all duties and taxes for the import of Solar Panels, storage batteries or components of storage batteries for local manufacture and assembly. To ensure that the concession relates directly to this development; the duty benefit should only be offered for importing both solar panels and batteries together in one package. This will still provide the usual revenue from import of storage batteries for automotive and industrial uses. To encourage this endeavour, government should provide liberal term credit facilities for those who want to import and set up or sell Solar Panels to customers.
This will naturally increase GDP, as more power is generated from solar source. Also it will reduce the import of kerosene, as most of the rural and also many small urban towns rely upon it for all their lighting needs; which will come from solar panels. It will also grow rural small service facilities for the servicing, battery charging and wiring related to the application of solar power supply! Given positive support, backed by wide publicity, it is quite possible to generate around 1,000MW of solar power within two years!
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