Solar Kumidzi is a tightly linked collaboration of sister organizations (org chart here) with a vision for sustainable energy and community empowerment. Our family of organizations includes the Malawi organizations:

Africa Sun Power (AFSP)
Kachione LLC
Rachel & Christina Solar Devices
Affordable Solar for Villagers (AS4V) NGO

The American organizations are:

Solar4Africa, which consists of American volunteers and donors under founder Dr. Robert Van Buskirk's leadership

Omprakash Foundation, which is solar4africa's 501(c)3 fiscal sponsor

Our journey began with a commitment to providing reliable and affordable solar technology to rural communities in Malawi. We build and distribute essential solar products — solar lights, batteries, irrigation pumps, and DC electric pressure cookers — through a network of solar shops established by local women entrepreneurs. Our solar shops serve not only as a sustainable distribution system for our products, but also empower the women who run these shops, fostering economic growth for each village.

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Robert Van Buskirk and Laurence Kachione began their collaboration in 2016. Kachione staff members Rachel Kanyerere and Christina Molesi began organizing womens' groups to share solar irrigation pumps in 2021. This evolved into a network of ten to fifteen women-led village solar shops organized and supplied by Rachel & Christina Solar Devices. In 2024 the local Malawi NGO Affordable Solar for Villagers was established to gain import tax benefits for our products sold at subsidized prices to rural low income Malawians, and to create an administrative structure guided by a board of directors to serve its members: the network of villages and village solar shops.

The most recent addition to the Solar Kumidzi family is Africa Sun Power, a Malawi shareholder-owned corporation. The company has been created with the support of MECS/CLASP venture building grant. It is already showing increasing total book value through cost-effective procurement of the solar equipment that it will be selling over the coming year. Its dual income streams are  (1) selling solar products with an emphasis on solar electric pressure cookers, and (2) selling CO2 reduction + poverty reduction impact credits at a rate of $ 0.15/kwhr, as documented by metered energy use of its solar appliances. It has already sold and installed solar electric cooker systems for 20 women's collectives in Lundu area of northern Blantyre District, and plans to expand to serve 200 women's groups across the Central and Southern regions of Malawi in 2027. In addition to the 200 women's groups, the company plans to serve more than 1,000 rural customers with clean, low-cost, off-grid solar e-cooking in 2027.