In Nguni, a language of Southeast Africa, “shesha” means fast, instantaneous. The word must have served as a spark of inspiration to Totalgaz as a moniker for their new product, described as Safe, Handy, Economic, Stable, Healthy and Affordable. The acronym refers to a small, easy-to-carry, inexpensive and safe bottle of LPG brought on to the market by the South-African subsidiary in late 2004. Fitted with a control safety valve offering a definite advantage over the competition, the Shesha cylinder can be connected directly to a hotplate, a two-burner stove via a flexible hose or even a radiant radiator. This comprehensive solution  is helping to meet the essential needs of the township populations in Cape Town and Johannesburg.
Some 80,000 bottles have already been put on the market in South Africa: a big success story and a small indication of the long path ahead when you think that the district of Soweto alone is home to over one million people. Expectations are running even higher with access to energy a top-billing priority for the African continent. “Two billion individuals around the world don’t have any access to electricity, according to the figures compiled by the UNDP (United Nations Development Project)”, specifies Paul Harris, a manager at the firm Integrated Energy Solutions in charge of auditing the Shesha project. This number includes the many people who heat their homes and cook using firewood or animal dung. Everybody tries to provide a solution to these problems.

A political appeal

One of the first proposals put forward came from Kofi Annan, the then Secretary-General of the United Nations, at the World Summit on Sustainable Development held in Johannesburg in 2002. The Millennium Declaration drafted at the meeting stipulated that reliable and affordable access to energy ranked among the priorities for humanity. The creation of the LPG Rural E-nergy Challenge, much encouraged and backed by the South African government in early 2004, was a direct response to these priorities. A few months later, Totalgaz put its first Shesha cylinder on sale and presented a spectacular programme to develop the little orange bottle.
The success of the product was accelerated by circumstance when, in the austral summer of 2005-2006, the Koeberg nuclear power plant, which typically provides 30% of Cape Town’s electricity, was hit by a prolonged technical incident and forced to reduce production by half. To cope with the shortage, the government had to propose emergency solutions for alternatives before winter. “We launched a massive communications campaign to raise awareness among the local population on the importance of economising energy,” explains Lodine Redelinghuys, Sales Director for Eskom, South Africa’s answer to British Gas. “Then we had to take concrete measures. These included developing LPG as an alternative energy, which became the focus of a vast programme and attracted outstanding support from all parties concerned.” In a few weeks, 100,000 electric hotplates were exchanged for LPG-fuelled stoves to avoid penalising low-income households, the primary victims of the power shortage. LPG marketers, Eskom and the South African Government Department of Minerals and Energy (DME) reached an agreement and the price of gas was calculated and indexed on paraffin oil and electricity. Thanks to subsidies from Eskom, the five-kg refill was offered at seven rands per kilo (around 48 pence). The responsive and committed involvement of industrial partners was decisive in hastening Totalgaz’ commercial success. Shesha currently holds a 60% market share and has notched up a popularity rating that a visit to a township would only confirm. “The subsidiary sold 1,200 tonnes of LPG in 2006,” says its Managing Director, Hugo De Meyer. “The potential market is 90,000 tonnes from now to 2009!” Proof, if it were needed, that sustainable development and profitable development are not incompatible.

The first keys to success

Eskom’s replacement programme certainly led to repercussions on the economic and social environment. “In the district of Guguletu, for instance, where over 500,000 persons live with limited resources and in especially close quarters, the choice to introduce LPG brought a satisfactory response to many points,” explains Hugo De Meyer. “In terms of health and safety, clearly, but also society. In rural and outlying-suburban areas, the female population are no longer obliged to collect firewood, and LPG is the best means to provide access to energy.” Easy to transport and store away, Shesha is also multifunctional, equally practical for cooking, heating and lighting. Out of the 80,000 bottles sold by Totalgaz, the majority today equip the four townships in Cape Town: a direct consequence of the incentives offered by the Eskom programme. With the upcoming second phase aimed at covering the huge needs of the rural and outlying-suburban areas, as well as the impoverished districts of Johannesburg that to date are deprived of access to energy, the model developed in the shanty towns Langa and Khayelitsha is sure to gain widespread acceptance.

A community-based network

“The secret to the success of this kind of sustainable development project,” explains Hugo De Meyer, “is to work closely with the grass-roots of the community.” Visitors to the region would be surprised to see the sheer density of the urban network and even more the occupants’ attachment to a collective way of life. Despite efforts from the government, many families have refused to leave their makeshift shelters for unlikely permanent houses, preferring the community lifestyle over solitary comfort. In spite of the upcoming Football World Cup in 2010, those who would like to see the disappearance of Khayelitsha, the shanty town that spreads out between the airport and town centre and is inhabited by one million people, are in for a disappointment. This situation confirms the relevance of the model introduced by Total.
“The main depot or filling station must be less than 10 kilometres from the final consumer,” continues Hugo De Meyer, “and we need to rely on a network of intermediate resellers that are fully integrated into the local community”. Totalgaz has installed five containers around Cape Town that are used, as is customary in the region for any type of commerce, as retail points for sale of LPG cylinders. Four other resellers complete the system and the majority of Shesha resellers, like Tendiwe, the first to test out the method in Langa, depend on go-betweens at the heart of the district. Guguletu, another outlying-suburban district of Cape Town, has two sales containers and performs 300 refills each week. 

The model continues to make converts

“We want to make the most of this growth phase to make the process widespread,” says Mpumi Gaba representing LPGSASA (Liquefied Petroleum Gas Safety Association of Southern Africa). “The government and its partners are setting down an alternative energy policy on LPG in order to guarantee the production of three million bottles by 2009, an achievable target if current methods are adhered to. The real challenge is more industrial in nature: how can market supply and price regulation be safeguarded?”
The extent of their needs is undeniably large – and not just in South Africa. The reality in Cape Town’s townships has shown that there is a concrete way to drastically improve the lives of hundreds of thousands of people, living by and large below the poverty line, and assure economic profitability. After all, this is ultimately the surest guarantee for a long-term solution. Yet many question marks hang over the future development of Shesha and other similar products from Total and its competitors. Refining capacities in South Africa are inadequate to cover future needs and, for lack of an alternative (the country has poor import facilities), annual LPG production is limited to a mere 400,000 tonnes by six refineries.

A few obstacles to great potential

Such a just-in-time approach offers no security for energy supply. The least fault at a refinery causes an interruption in supply, as events over the last few months in the country have borne out. Fluctuating available stock, uncertain State subsidies and the lack of dialogue between market players are so many constraints to moving the project forward. Logistical and financial considerations also affect the concerned populations’ problems of accessing energy. Logistically speaking, LPG is significantly ahead of electricity. It will be decades before most rural and outlying-suburban areas in South Africa receive electric power, whereas Shesha will long since have penetrated the remotest villages and townships of the region.
In financial terms, it would appear that, according to the interested parties, no subsidies means no Shesha is still out of reach. The cost of the LPG package varies between 160 and 500 rands depending on its configuration (between £11 and £34), which is still unaffordable for many households. After the Koeberg plant stoppage, the first wave of orange swept over Cape Town thanks to subsidies from Eskom (i.e. indirectly from the South-African government). Now new solutions need to be imagined. “Following on from the agreement reached between India and the Grameen Bank, we could develop microcredit funds – for women in particular,” suggests Hugo De Meyer. “An opportunity may also exist with South-African municipalities that receive governmental development funds and commonly operate as gas distribution service providers. They could also operate as banks!” So many questions that require answers – and fast ones at that – if the government’s target of 3 million bottles by 2009 is to be met.