I have recently developed a new business idea. This one is an amalgamation of charity, environemental protection, and socially responsible business.

A little background:

Thought no 1. On my journeys to Cambodia and Egypt, I witnessed rampant poverty. People had no source of electricity, or clean water. Children ran barefeet on dusty unpaved roads. In Cambodia, due to the lack of utility, people buy lead-acid batteries to power their houses, and charge them up at charging stations. The lack of clean water contributes to the death of many in the world today.

Thought no 2. Many developed countries today are deeply addicted to fossil fuel. A lot of infrastructure has been built to support this addiction. This makes the change to alternative fuel difficult, because it’s easier to stick with the status quo, until it’s too late.

Thought no 3. Many countries in development seek an easy and well trodden path, taken by many more developed countries, to prosperity. I hear that in Myanmar, the government is banning the use of re-usable utensils in the street vendors, to thwart the spread of hepatitis B. The alternatives are polystyrene, PET and other disposable material. Taiwan went through a similar path long during its adolescent stages of development, but this choice generated huge environmental headaches that will have to be dealt with many year later. Since these developing nations have a new chance to make fresh choices in development, they should be given a chance to learn from these other countries, and make the right choice. More developed countries have a moral and practical duty to assist and ensure the people in the developing countries don’t make the same mistakes as they did.

So, the business idea is as follows:

Making modularized power systems consist of a power source and a power-utilization source.

The power source could be: solar/wind/hydrolic system.
The power utilization source could be a water purification unit, a charging station, hydrogen generator, etc.

This system should be small, and could be purchased via micro-loans and/or village fund. This would allow villages to solve these basic problems by themselves.

The funding of these units could also be backed by charities.

Here is a nice video clip from Sarah McLachlan, called World on Fire.

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