copenhagen-toyolaWhen foreign investors visit Suraj Wahab in the Ghanaian capital of Accra, where he manufactures energy-efficient stoves, he likes to point to a tree on the dusty roadside just outside his business’s building. He tells them that before investors were willing to back him, his company’s headquarters were housed in the shade of that very tree. There, he’d work in the dirt with his hands, molding household cooking stoves. Wahab’s company, Toyola Energy Limited, has grown out from under the shade and into a five-building main complex with eight other factories and distribution centers around the country. He used to make just five stoves a week. In 2010 his 150 employees could make 75,000. And if this week’s Copenhagen talks have a meaningful outcome, his business could really heat up. (more…)