IVORY COAST • Little Michel Koutouan's grades have been improving lately and he readily gives credit to his specially-invented solar backpack.

There is no electricity at his home in Songon, a village in the south-eastern region of the Ivory Coast, which makes it hard for him to study at night. But this changed for him and dozens of other children in Songon and the nearby village of Grand Aferi, when they were given the backpacks.

The bags have a solar plate that stores energy from the sun during the day and is then used to power an LED lamp to provide hours of light each night.

The man behind the Solarpak, Mr Evariste Akoumian, came up with the idea when he was delivering computer equipment and office supplies to remote villages around the country that lacked electric power.

"We said to ourselves: In Africa, we have lots of sunshine which is free. Let's figure out an easier and more efficient solution to help these children so that they can have better academic results," he said.

It took Mr Akoumian two years of research and six months of field testing to finalise the product.