Factors Influencing Adoption of Solar Technology in Tanzania: A Case Study of Arumeru District

The study analyzes factors affecting adoption of solar energy technology in Tanzania, basing on the following objectives: to analyze the extent to which awareness of solar technology affects its adoption, to determine the influence of household income on adoption of solar technology, to analyze to what extent does reliability of solar technology affects its adoption and to analyze the role of government policy on adoption of domestic solar technology using Arumeru District as the case study. This study applied the cross-sectional research design by applying both qualitative and quantitative research approach. The population of the study was Arumeru, District, Tanzania. The determined sample size was 97 from the population of 2, 978 for quantitative data and only 90 questionnaires were returned. Data were collected on random sampling. The qualitative data used a sample of 10 respondents who were interviewed. Thus, data were collected using structured closed ended questionnaire and unstructured interviews. Data were analyzed using descriptive and content analysis. Quantitative data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and qualitative data were analyzed using content analysis. The study findings are as follows: With regards to awareness and its influence on the adoption of the solar technology respondents agreed. This indicates that, awareness influences adoption of solar technology to the people of Arumeru district. With respect to weather income affects adaptation of solar technology, 90 % of respondents agreed that income affects the adoption of technology. On other hand solar energy reliability affects its adoption an average. With respect to whether the government supports affects solar technology the respondents agreed. This implies that, the government policy is supportive on solar energy adoption. This study recommends that the government and other service providers ensure the delivery of the lighting services to the users, providing loan for the purchase of the lighting system, creating awareness over the solar technology to the users. Finding the proper linkage of the solar services to the national grid so as to overcome the doubling cost of the installation to the users of the services at large. It is suggested that study should be carried on the challenges emanating from the adoption of the solar technology and also the impact for the adoption of the solar technology to the services users at Arumeru district and country at large.