NAIROBI, KENYA — Milk and egg vendor Caroline Mukundi has lost a lot of her stock in her years of selling fresh food at a Nairobi market.
Mukundi said she had no way to keep food fresh, and the cost of refrigerating was out of reach.
“The food would go bad,” she said, and she would have to throw it away. “It was a big challenge for me.”
Mukundi said her situation turned around when she acquired a solar-powered refrigerator.
The refrigerators, named Koolboks and manufactured in Kenya, are fitted with ice compartments that can chill food even without a source of power. The devices can keep food cool for up to four days without electricity, even with limited sunlight.
Customers can buy the refrigerators on a customized payment model, said Natalie Casey, chief business officer at the Koolboks startup company.
“They can be between 1,500 and 3,000 US dollars, because it includes not only the appliances but also the solar panels and battery storage to enable the continuous cooling,” she said. “We’ve decided what might be more accessible to them is to first pay a down payment between 20 and 35% of the total, and the customer can pay in installments of up to 24 months.”
Koolboks has sold about 7,000 solar-powered refrigerators.
Conventional refrigerators for businesses can cost anywhere from $11,000 to $100,000 or more, said Dorothy Otieno, program manager at the Center for Environmental Justice and Development.
“Some businesses, especially small businesses, are not able to afford it,” she said.
“We are looking at, for example, how businesses can be supported to get access to [the Koolboks refrigerators], especially for communities that are not able to afford,” she said.
The refrigerator was among dozens of innovations showcased at the recent Africa Tech Summit in Nairobi. The conference’s founder, Andrew Fassnidge, told VOA that such creations are crucial to solving local problems on the continent.
“What’s interesting with … Koolboks refrigeration is, if we look at the Covid vaccine, one of the biggest issues at the time was refrigeration, and it’s still an issue in most markets,” he said.
Koolboks markets a refrigerator specifically for vaccines.
The refrigerators could have an impact on climate change, too.
A 2024 survey by the U.N. Environmental Program showed Kenya has a high level of food waste, with annual waste ranging from 40 to 100 kilograms per person.
Environmentalists say high levels of organic waste worsen climate change, so preventing food waste can have an impact.
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