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The Rural Electrification Agency (REA) has renewed its partnership with German artificial intelligence and data analytics company, VIDA place GmbH, to strengthen data-driven electricity planning and accelerate Nigeria’s quest for universal access to electricity.
The one-year renewal of the partnership was signed on Wednesday in Abuja during the visit of the German Federal Minister for Foreign Affairs, Dr. Johann Wadephul.
Speaking after the signing, REA Chief Executive Officer/Chief Executive Officer, Dr Abba Aliyu, said the collaboration will enable the agency to use public funds more efficiently to provide electricity to disadvantaged communities.
Aliyu said Nigeria’s electrification drive requires accurate data to identify communities without electricity and determine the least costly approach to connecting them.
He said: “Nigeria has one of the highest numbers of people without electricity and we have secured a $750 million World Bank-funded program to electrify 17.5 million Nigerians.
“We don’t want to just take this funding and start electrifying communities. We need data. We need a plan that tells us where these Nigerians are without electricity, the number of households in those communities and the least expensive option to provide electricity.”
He said VIDA developed an AI-based platform that mapped communities across the country, providing information on household size, socioeconomic indicators and the status of electrification.
“The essence of the partnership is to ensure that public funds are used in the most cost-effective way. Artificial intelligence has saved us the cost and time of physically visiting communities to collect this information,” he added.
Aliyu noted that the platform has also improved transparency in the allocation of subsidies under the World Bank-funded Distributed Access through Renewable Energy Expansion program and has attracted interest from other African countries looking to adopt similar models.
