Last fall, Mark Bent, founder and CEO of SunNight Solar, a company that distributes solar-powered flashlights to developing nations, had already been recruited as a Clinton Global Initiative member to deliver 500,000 lights as part of his Light Haiti project. But, in the hours after the earthquake in Haiti, Bent met with former President Bill Clinton in Miami. “He hugged me and whispered in my ear, ’500,000 is not going to be enough any more,’” recalls Bent.
Even before the earthquake, more than 85 percent of the population lacked access to electricity and the country, which is the poorest in the Western Hemisphere, also had the lowest electric power coverage. With an earthquake that has devastated the infrastructure and left even more in Haiti without electricity, lack of lighting is a huge safety and productivity problem. A recent AP story, for example, shed light on the increasing frequency of rapes and sexual assaults on women and children living in stadium camps and sprawling tent cities, where lack of illumination poses an enormous risk to personal safety. The story indicated rape was a problem even before the earthquake, but has become an increasing — although still underreported — issue for vulnerable women and girls who live under tarps or in tents and have often lost male family members — spouses, fathers, brothers, cousins — who may have protected them.
Before he started SunNight Solar in 2006, Bent had spent two decades working as a foreign diplomat in war- and disaster-scourged places around the globe and realized there was one universal issue that hindered developing countries: darkness. Lack of electricity shortened work days, prevented children from doing schoolwork and posed an array of health and safety risks, either from fires caused by kerosene, cancer from kerosene smoke, or darkness that cloaked crime. He decided to use the latest technology of solar power, rechargeable batteries and LED light, which is far more powerful, cheaper and lasts longer, to come up with a solution and to make a difference in the world, one solar-powered flashlight at a time.
“I did not start this company because I wanted to be a flashlight vendor – I did this because I knew of the issues of sexual violence in refugee camps and I knew that lighting would make a difference,” says Bent. ”It’s quite empowering. I can’t imagine how terrifying it must be to be a woman in Haiti right now.”
The BoGo flashlights are designed to last 50,0000 hours or between 18 and 20 years and the rechargeable AA batteries they use last three years or 750 to 1,000 cycles of use. The light from a single BoGo flashlight illuminates a 4×4 square meter of space at about twice the power of a kerosene lamp. The World Bank estimates that the average family in a developing country spends as much as 20 to 30 percent of their disposable income on lighting and eliminating this expense allows funds to be spent on extra livestock, education or medicine.
There are 2 billion people on the planet — nearly one third of the world’s population — who lack electricity and rely on kerosene. Having access to light positively impacts education, safety and security, economic productivity, health and the environment. For example, Bent says that the Haiti ambassador to the US Raymond Alcide Joseph was in Haiti last August and one day gave a SunNight Solar flashlight to a woman whom he saw later that night selling her vegetables on the side of the road. Bent recalls she said, “Thank God, thank President Clinton — all we need is light.”
Bent says of the conditions in the Haiti camps, “They’re incredibly vulnerable at night, especially when they have to go to the bathroom. They’re prey — they really are. My lights were designed from inception to meet these exact needs. Women are targeted during the day and preyed upon at night so you put a light on the identification of the assailant and that is hopefully enough to deter the attack. We can’t give them 100 percent protection, but hopefully lighting will help. Men will do things in darkness they wouldn’t do in the light. If a man knows he can be identified by the community, then he probably won’t do the rape.”
Bent has NGO and humanitarian partners on the ground in Haiti able to distribute the lights, the technology is cheap and effective, but the challenge, he said, is getting the funds to pay for them. Since the earthquake, he’s been able to deliver 7,000 lights in Haiti, but as Clinton pointed out in the hours after the disaster, hundreds of thousands more are needed. While Bent is always seeking corporate donations, the public is encouraged to give, as well. Anyone can donate online at lighthaiti.org by buying either the mini BoGo for $10, the larger BoGo2 for $20 or a case of 50 lights for $500 or $1,000, respectively.
The economics of putting solar powered flashlights into the hands of those who need them is powerful. “The mini BoGos are $10 and its light will last up to 20 years. That $10 and that one light will impact as many as ten people at night and there is nothing else you can give the Haitian people that has that kind of impact,” says Bent. “Nothing.”
Photos courtesy of SunNight Solar.