Communal Meters Bring Light to Rural Georgia
Georgia’s infamous electricity shortages have affected rural areas the worst. Routine power rationing and blackouts often lead to rural Georgians going weeks without electricity.
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Abasha resident Shota Shalamberidze (center) has no problem sharing electricity with his village neighbors: “My family has a small mill, which is the only source of income for us. When I used to steal electricity, I knew that I was stealing from the government. Now everything has changed. I cannot steal from my neighbors. UEDC gave us a wonderful gift by installing communal meters. At first, we were scared and had little faith in this initiative. Now we have a 24- hour electricity supply and learned how to consume electricity efficiently.”
Photo Credit: Eka Urida |
To make matters worse, electricity meters installed in the 1960s in rural communities like Abasha in western Georgia, were out of order and disregarded by both electricity consumers and the national electricity utility, United Energy Distribution Company (UEDC). No matter how much electricity they used, people from Abasha (and other rural villages) paid a nominal monthly fee of about $1.60 to UEDC’s bill collectors, who often pocketed part of the money collected.
In 2003, USAID launched the Georgia Energy Security Initiative, which includes a management contract for the UEDC. UEDC’s new management decided that communal metering might go a long way toward solving rural energy problems.
UEDC began to work with rural community leaders, including those in Abasha, to communicate the benefits of communal metering, in which about 50 rural families share a meter and pay for their electricity as a group. After several months of town hall-type meetings with UEDC staff, the people of Abasha were convinced that, with the help of communal meters, they would be able to control their electricity usage and receive a reliable power supply in return for regular bill payments. All 12,000 families in Abasha now pay for electricity according to what is recorded on their communal meters.
The residents of Abasha have even gone so far as to repair the individual meters that have been sitting broken in their homes for more than 30 years so that they can have more individual control over electricity use and payments. Each group of villagers united by a communal meter has nominated a bill collector whom now makes regular payments to UEDC at a designated bill payment office. One meter even put an end to a long-running land feud between two neighbors: “It is amazing that the dispute, which could not be settled by relatives or courts, was resolved with the help of this metal box. Now my neighbor and I often raise toasts to communal meters.” Other residents of Abasha enjoy watching the news on TV and using their household appliances – simple pleasures that were not available just several months ago.
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