The Southern African Development Community (SADC) Centre for Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency (SACREEE) is a UN organization established by the SADC Member States in 2015 to contribute towards increased access to modern energy services and improved energy security across the SADC Region through the promotion of market-based uptake of renewable energy (RE) and energy-efficient (EE) technologies and energy services.
The digital presence of the organization consisted of a website built with an outdated version of Drupal, featuring outdated graphics. The organization needed to modernize its online presence with a new website that offers enhanced functionalities and includes a community forum.
About the project
Our partner managed the PPP (Public-Private Partnership) proposal to execute this project, and they partnered with GeoNovation for the technical aspects of the project. Their collaboration involves analyzing the customer's needs, defining project requirements, and building the website and community forum.
After conducting an analysis of the customer's needs and assessing their current technological status, we have decided to proceed with the development using Drupal 9 as the chosen CMS. Drupal is well-suited for a cooperative website, offering security, reliability, and familiarity to the customer due to their previous experience with Drupal.
Adhering to the user guidelines and incorporating colors that represent the Southern African countries, our designer has worked on a new user experience (UX) and user interface (UI) design. We have sent the proposed design to the customer for their approval.
After receiving approval of the proposal during a meeting in Windhoek, Namibia, we initiated the development process in Drupal, starting with a new custom template based on a Bootstrap template. We added new functionalities and custom modules to enhance the website.
The entire development process was carried out using Git and the Gitflow workflow, which involved Pull Requests and Drupal configuration.
The final design was developed using SCSS (Sass) and organized into different files, following a specific naming convention that aligns with Drupal standards. This approach will facilitate future maintenance activities.
Throughout the development, we managed various functionalities, including:
- Created a React component to navigate through the member states of SADC, synchronized with member state descriptions via a RESTful API.
- Developed custom content types to manage data related to member states, stakeholders, and policy documents.
- Implemented pipelines to enable bulk CSV document uploads.
- Designed employment and procurement forms.
- Provided multi-language support for English, French, and Portuguese.
- Developed custom views and modules to manage specific functionalities related to events and opportunities.
- Ensured content synchronization with GN-SEC (Global Network of Regional Sustainable Energy Centers) and UNIDO (United Nations Industrial Development Organization).
- Conducted SEO optimization to improve search engine visibility.
Why Drupal was chosen
1. The customer knows Drupal 7, making it easier to organize training for Drupal 10
2. The website makes a lot of usage of Content Types and taxonomies to manage files, content, and news
3. There was a need to synchronize with other GN-SEC websites using the feed XML.
4. The flexibility to code, apply patches and keep the code in GIT, in different environment
5. The need to code a theme from scratch.
Technical Specifications
Drupal version:
