China · 2025
300 lights for village roads in Jiyuan
A rural illumination programme covering village access roads, delivered as one batch and installed with the local works team.
What the site needed
Village roads in the area are narrow, unlit and used by farm vehicles after dark. Mains power reaches the houses but not the field roads, and the budget belonged to a public programme rather than a utility, so the installation had to work without a connection and without a maintenance contract.
How it was run
- A single 100 W all-in-one model, sized for a 6 m pole and a 20 m spacing.
- Pole and foundation supplied locally to keep freight volume down.
- One engineer on site for the first 40 units, then remote support by video.
- A laminated one-page maintenance card left with each village committee.
What it proves
Programme work lives or dies on the file, not the hardware. The recipient has to show a funder what was bought, where it went and who signed for it. We now ship every programme batch with a photo sheet, a serial list and a handover form, because that pack is what gets the next village approved.
Programme budget, per village
| Typical package | 10 lights, 6 m poles, brackets |
| Product and freight | USD 2,450 |
| Local pole and civil work | USD 600 |
| Installation and supervision | USD 350 |
| Documentation and reporting | Included |
| Total programme cost | About USD 3,400 per village |
Illustrative. Donor programmes usually fix the unit budget before the site is chosen, so the design has to fit the budget rather than the other way round.
What to copy, what to avoid
- Design to the programme budget, not to the ideal specification.
- The photo sheet and serial list are part of the product.
- Local poles cut freight by half and create a local stakeholder.
- Leave a maintenance card in the local language.
Send the site. We will send the file.
Road width, water source, destination and the document your funder or customs office expects. You will get a configuration, a price and the evidence list in one reply.