The Indonesian government set up the Village Self-sufficient Energy Program (Desa Mandiri
Energy/DME), the aim of which is to provide 2000 poor, remote villages with modern energy systems
based on renewable materials that can be sustainably operated by the local community. By January 2009,
however, only 430 villages had been electrified.
The purpose of the project is to improve the rate of implementation of the DME program and thus to
contribute to the dissemination of renewable energy sources in rural regions of Indonesia. The quality of
the implementation process is to be improved through a structured dialogue between all the involved
parties including self-evaluations and independent evaluations. As a support, several studies will be
prepared in order to identify examples of good practice and also to develop a uniform implementation
structure as well as proposals for suitable technologies. The dialogue will be accompanied by a training
program designed to boost the technological capacities of the implementation structures.