SEforALL Country Action – concrete steps towards ending energy poverty

Five SEforALL Memoranda of Understanding signed with African Countries 23. September 2014/New York -This week, the European Union and European and African countries joined forces for Sustainable Energy for All, taking the lead in fighting against energy poverty. The European Union supported by individual EU countries (Austria, France, Luxemburg, Portugal, Spain) and Norway concretised plans for the objectives of Sustainable Energy for All with Cape Verde, Ivory Coast, Liberia, Rwanda and Togo at the margins of the Climate Summit by signing respective agreements inter alia in the presence of the President of the European Commission José Manuel Barroso, Rwandan President Paul Kagame, Togo's President Faure Gnassingbé, Norwegian Minister of Foreign Affairs Børge Brende, EU Development Commissioner Andris Piebalgs, Land, Mines and Energy Minister Patrick Sendolo of Liberia; France's Junior Minister for Development and Francophonie Annick Girardin; Permanent Representative of Cape Verde to the UN Fernando Jorge Wahnon Ferreira. The EU commitment to help developing countries to provide access to sustainable energy services to 500 million people by 2030, as pledged at the EU Sustainable Energy for All Summit in Brussels in 2012, is as strong as ever.The European Union has announced an initial funding of 3 billion Euros to leverage between 15 and 30 billion Euros over the next six years to address energy poverty.