By Christopher Njoku

To ensure a greater part of the country’s farm yield does not get wasted due to challenges emanating from either erratic power supply or storage facilities reliant on power, Nigerian Cold Hub company has developed a solar-powered food storage design, Cold Hub, to empower small, medium and large scale farmers.

In a seminar Organised by the Delegation of German Industry and Commerce in Nigeria & the Consulate General of the Federal Republic of Germany in Lagos, titled “Start-ups in Renewable Energy,” and aimed at giving young creative German and Nigerian entrepreneurs with innovative ideas and sustainable business models a platform to share experiences and introduce their business models and products, the Cold Hub, through the German foreign energy policy fund has introduced the design, Cold hub, to support young entrepreneurs who are especially involved in agriculture but record loses due to lack of storage facilities or power hindrances.

Speaking, Mr. Benjamin Igbokwe, Chief operating officer Cold hub said the design is essentially built to greatly reduce post-harvest loss for 470 million small farmers in Africa, Latin America and Southeast Asia.

“Our innovation, ColdHubs extends shelf life of perishable food from 2 to 21 days. Perishable food especially fresh fruits and vegetables start to deteriorate as soon as they are harvested because they are cut off from their source of water and nutrition. They lose weight, texture, flavor, nutritional value and appeal. Cooling significantly slows down the rate of deterioration, thereby increasing the storage life of the produce.” he said.

Also, Mr. Femi Adeyemo, the CEO Arnergy Solar limited, in his presentation, said that energy is a for-profit mini-utility social enterprise that leverages on credit analytics and prepaid metering technology to deploy solar energy solutions to homes and businesses across Africa.

He said that the product lightens up homes and offices in cities across Africa with innovative solar solutions, offering a broad range of solar solutions tailor-made for residential homes, SMEs and large enterprises.

“Arnergy is a Nigerian startup tackling the growing demand for urban rooftop solar energy in Nigeria. We custom design solar energy systems for commercial and residential clients using tried and tested, intelligent solar energy system ensuring Africans have 24/7 power in their homes while reducing operating expenses of African businesses saving them huge costs otherwise spent on diesel/petrol generator maintenance and increased revenue otherwise lost to cut in production.”

We are pioneering the frontier in rural and urban electrification through the provision of affordable and highly efficient electricity from solar energy.”

“We provide two main solutions: Pay As You Go (PAYG) Solar Home System (SHS) and MiniGrid Solutions for Rural residents and Solar Packages for Urban homes and businesses.
ARNERGY has powered 2,000+ Households and small businesses in 5 rural villages in Nigeria with solar.”

Mobisol, a German based Solar producing organisation, in it’s presentation, delivered by Mr. Ekene Aina, partnership and expansion manager Mobisol said that its solar power gives a consumer an opportuity to run all home appliances. Saying that the organisations customer base includes Tanzania, Kenya, Rwanda and Nigeria. “We are in Nigeria on a fact finding mission, we started with focussing on rural customers, Mobisol provides a system that can power a range of appliances.”He said.