Rural electrification is the process of bringing electrical power to rural and remote areas. Electricity is used not only for lighting and household purposes, but it also allows for mechanization of many farming operations, such as threshing, milking, and hoisting grain for storage. In areas facing labor shortages, this allows for greater productivity at reduced cost. One famous program was the New Deal's Rural Electrification Administration in the United States, which pioneered many of the schemes still practiced in other countries. According to IEA (2009) worldwide 1.456 billion people do not have access to electricity, of which 83% live in rural areas. In Sub-Saharan Africa less than 10% of the rural population has access to electricity. Worldwide rural electrification progresses only slowly. The IEA estimates that, if current trends do not change, the number of people without electricity will rise to 1.2 billion by the year 2030. Due to high population growth, the number of people without electricity is expected to rise in Sub-Saharan Africa.
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