Zambian township battles with endless power cuts

During an afternoon power cut in the Lusaka township of Bauleni, 52-year-old Stanford Mwanza varnishes a wardrobe and does what work he can in his carpentry workshop. "It’s a hell of a problem," Mwanza says of daily 8-hour power cuts. "The power went at 10 a.m. this morning and now we just have to wait. Normally it takes me 3 weeks to finish a wardrobe but this one has taken 2 months."

For Bauleni's 15,000 residents, power cuts - called load shedding - follow a continuous 8-hour rotation, while schedules vary in the capital Lusaka (pop. 1.4 million). During blackouts people resort to generators - if they can afford to. An erratic rainy season from last October to March this year is blamed for the energy crisis in a country in which almost all power is hydroelectric.

There’s little activity at welding workshops, during Bauleni’s mid-afternoon power cut. The welders spend much of their time chatting. And because of the cuts much of the day goes to waste.

"If food defrosts, we have to throw it away so we must use a generator, which is expensive," says Bismark Musheke, 22, in a Bauleni butcher’s shop. Power cuts cause 40 percent additional costs in emerging economies, the Wold Bank estimates. Too much for many local businesses. "The situation is creating high unemployment, then production goes down. It’s affecting the whole economy," Musheke says.

Due to power cuts, demand for charcoal has increased significantly, as have charcoal prices for many living on just a couple of dollars a day. "Charcoal supplies are often sold out by ten in the morning rather than by four in the afternoon. Even before the power cuts Zambia had Africa’s fastest rate of deforestation," conservationist Jo Pope says.

Ten-year-old Natasha makes the most of power returning to Bauleni to fill buckets of water from a communal tap - the four local water pump stations don’t work during blackouts. "Then there’s no water for toilets and it’s hard to wash clothes," says 49-year-old Dinna, wife of Stanford Mwanza. "Sometimes we have to get up at 3 a.m. to fill the buckets."

Over in Tenderer East, a larger Lusaka township, 59-year-old taxi driver Grivin Phiri (right) stands with his 19-year-old son Rabson next to a machine used to make about 50 jars of peanut butter a week to sell to neighbors for extra income. "I want to make it every day but can only do it when there’s power," Phiri says. "So I don’t care what time it is - if there’s power I’ll make peanut butter."

Phiri’s household uses an electric cooker and a charcoal brazier to cook food and heat water. "During the day we cook with charcoal even if there’s power as it’s cheaper," Phiri says. "We use the cooker for supper as it’s quicker, while we heat water on the brazier for bedtime." Each morning Rabson and one of his brothersnroll a 210-liter (55 US gallons) barrel to a communal tap to collect water.

"We lose customers," 24-year-old Clementina says at a Bauleni hair salon. "When we use the generator we must charge more, which annoys customers, plus it’s not big enough to do power drying and blowing at the same time. Our lives depend on the salon, if we don’t work, we don’t eat." While unsure of what’s caused the power crisis, she suspects a combination of lack of water and bad governance.

Most of Zambia’s hydroelectric power usually comes from the Kariba dam and the world’s largest man-made reservoir. But water levels are too low after poor rains, claim officials at the Zambia Electricity Supply Corporation (ZESCO). On a lucky evening such as this one, 33-year-old Robbie Mwanza can watch television with his wife and son.

Once power does return to Bauleni, Jabulani Keswa is back to making window frames. He says his usual output of five a day is down to two. Looking at one on the ground, he says: "The owner wanted this yesterday." Then he switches on his blowtorch to quickly work on the order. "If power comes on at night, you don’t feel like working and when you wake up there's no power," he says.