Zambia is distributing 156 standardised solar plants across every constituency in the country under a programme that gives local councils an equity stake in each site — a structure designed to generate revenue for community development rather than consolidate generation assets on a central utility’s balance sheet.
The Presidential Constituency Energy Initiative (PCEI), valued at ZMW 4.3bn (approximately $238m), requires five contractors to build a 2MW solar plant with 4MWh of battery storage in each of the 156 constituencies within twelve months. The combined capacity across all sites reaches 312MW, and the government estimates the programme will create 15,600 jobs.
Nicholas Phiri, Permanent Secretary at the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development, described the equity arrangement as a revenue stream supporting community development. Under the model, a council that hosts a plant holds a stake in it rather than simply receiving the electricity it generates — a meaningful distinction for local governments that have historically had little financial exposure to energy infrastructure.
The programme is partly financed through the Constituency Development Fund, a government mechanism that channels public resources directly to constituency-level projects. Zambia Electricity Supply Corporation (ZESCO), the state utility, is not the developer here. Instead, ZESCO acts as project manager, setting technical standards and handling grid integration at each of the 156 connection points.
Five contractors won the awards, structured largely as joint ventures. Sunshare Construction is paired with China Railway Construction Engineering Group; Chetam Metals Fabrication with ZamChin Construction Company; and Golden Baobab Investments with Huawei Technologies Zambia. China Jiangxi International Corporation is working with Qingdao Haier Photovoltaic New Energy Company, while China Civil Engineering Construction Company Limited holds a contract independently. Three of the five lead contractors are Zambian-led.
The programme’s geographic scope carries a caveat. Zambia’s electoral commission added 70 new constituencies earlier in 2025, expanding the national map to 226. The PCEI as awarded covers the previous 156-constituency configuration, leaving the question of whether — and how — the additional constituencies will be served.
At 312MW, the initiative is a modest addition relative to ZESCO’s own build programme. The utility reached 800MW of solar capacity with the second phase of its Chisamba plant, against a national target of 10,000MW by 2030. Afrobarometer data adds further context: 47% of Zambian households already source electricity outside ZESCO, pointing to a generation gap that distributed models like the PCEI are partly designed to address.
What the programme ultimately tests is whether an equity stake held by a local authority produces a plant that is still running efficiently a decade from now — and whether that model can serve as a template for constituency-level energy financing elsewhere on the continent.
