With the intention of reinventing food security and air travel, Kenya has signed three agreements with Sweden, South Africa, and Hong Kong that promote environmentally friendly commerce and investment. This occurred at a side event for the Nairobi, Kenya, climate summit in 2023.
As part of the agreement with the Swedish company Cool Go Green, food preservation will be powered by sunshine in an effort to cut down on food waste and post-harvest losses. In the next five years, the company plans to invest $200 million (Sh28.9 billion) in the establishment of 40,000 cooling units around the nation.
According to Peter Korner, the company’s founder, the agreement will aim to give farmers and Kenyans in general the tools they need to use solar-powered cold storage containers to preserve food for a longer shelf life. Due to the high expense of both purchasing and maintaining preservation equipment, it is estimated that up to 40% of food in Kenya is lost after harvest.
“A significant number of farmers in Africa do not have access to reliable electricity and storage facilities. In addition, our technology sustains optimal cold storage conditions for up to seven days without external power sources,” Korner said.
Agri All Africa, a South African company, plans to invest $102 million (Sh14.7 billion) in climate-smart rice irrigation on 31,000 hectares of land in the Tana Delta. This is anticipated to assist Kenya in producing roughly 560,000 metric tons of rice annually and enable the country to avoid spending $690 million (Sh99.95 billion) on the importation of the crop.
Priscilla Motlhako, the company’s director, claims that this has resulted in more than 37,500 jobs and 175,000 carbon credits.
The government also reached an agreement with the taxi-hailing service Volar Air Mobility to launch the world’s first air taxi ride-hailing facility, providing a way to fly without polluting the atmosphere.
Volar Air provides a variety of services, including air taxis, flight schools, precise mapping, agricultural spraying, logistics, air ambulance, and humanitarian activities. Through the agreement, Kenya becomes the first nation in Africa where Volar Air Mobility will launch operations aimed at tourists who care about the environment.
The improvements, according to Trade CS Moses Kuria, would also improve air travel conditions and generate more than 40,000 employment, reducing the nation’s reliance on food imports.
According to Investment Promotion PS Abubakar Hassan, the innovations in the agriculture sector are in line with the government’s target to reduce food imports. “In Africa, about $48 billion (Sh6.9 trillion) worth of food is wasted annually. This contributes to the huge budgets the continent spends on food imports,” he said.