Subsidizing Technology, Neglecting Service: The Capability Costs of Nepal's Solar Irrigation Policy

• In Event: Lightning Session: Natural Resource, Energy, and Environmental Policy

Abstract

Solar-powered irrigation (SPI) is increasingly promoted across South Asia and sub-Saharan Africa as a means of raising smallholder productivity, stabilizing rural incomes, and reducing exposure to volatile fuel prices. Nepal's Renewable Energy Subsidy Policy, administered through the Alternative Energy Promotion Centre, has accelerated SPI diffusion across dispersed rural geographies since 2016. The livelihood returns from these installations, however, remain strikingly uneven. Some households realize meaningful gains in self-sufficiency and income, while others see installed systems underperform, fall idle, or generate new financial burdens. This variation is not simply a matter of adoption rates or hours of use, and it is poorly explained by models that treat technology access as the primary driver of outcomes. Drawing on Amartya Sen's Capability Approach, this paper argues that outcomes depend on how farmers' agency interacts with the conversion conditions that mediate the translation of irrigation resources into valued functionings. The guiding research question is: how does agency interact with conversion conditions to enable smallholder farmers in Nepal to translate access to solar-powered irrigation into multidimensional livelihood outcomes? Agency is conceptualized along three dimensions (decision-making autonomy, information access, and financial control), and conversion factors are operationalized through technician availability, post-installation training, local repair capacity, and institutional assistance. The study uses an explanatory mixed-methods design with 83 smallholder SPI adopters who received systems through subsidy or loan programs. Farmers are grouped into four outcome categories (Well-performing, Moderate, Struggling, and Unsuccessful) based on six functioning indicators, including goal attainment, self-sufficiency, cost savings, earnings, agricultural scheduling, and overall wellbeing. The analysis combines descriptive profiling across agency and conversion dimensions, three nested logistic regression models predicting wellbeing improvement, and thematic analysis of farmer narratives. The findings complicate conventional assumptions that higher agency alone produces stronger outcomes. Unsuccessful farmers reported the highest average agency composite score yet the weakest functionings, while Well-performing farmers reported only moderate agency but the strongest contact with formal technicians. The regression results reinforce this pattern. Neither land area irrigated by SPI nor information-based agency indicators (formal education and prior SPI knowledge) significantly predicted wellbeing improvement. Access to technician support, whether through formal vendor networks or local mechanics, emerged as a robust predictor, with supported farmers nearly four times more likely to report wellbeing gains (OR = 3.92, 95% CI [1.60, 9.99], p = 0.003). The narratives clarify the mechanism: broken controllers, damaged panels, and absent after-sales contact rapidly erode the functional value of installed systems, regardless of how autonomous or informed the user might be. These findings carry direct implications for subsidy design. Capital-focused policies that prioritize access without enforceable service obligations, decentralized technician networks, and structured post-installation training risk producing technology diffusion without the substantive freedoms that make such technology meaningful in farmers' lives.

Author

• Prashamsa Thapa, Arizona State University
  Presenting Author