Type. data.org project

Funding. This project is funded by the MasterCard Center for Inclusive Growth, The Rockefeller Foundation, and giz.

Duration. 2 years (2021-2023)

Collaborations. BASE, and local service providers in Nigeria.

Contact. Thijs Defraeye (principal investigator).

Project background. 

Nigeria suffers more than 40% post-harvest fresh produce losses due to improper storage facilities, unreliable electricity, poor distribution and poor processing for farmers. Small-holder farmers lose more than 40% of their income due to food spoilage while agriculture represents 22% of the country’s GDP and two-thirds of the labor force. Most perishable food such as fruits and vegetables are produced in remote areas, with long distances between the farm and the market. Due to lack of access to a cooling facility for the fresh produce at the farm-gate, the quality of the fresh produce that is sold in the nearest market is often quite low and also at a very low price. Off-grid cooling as a service is available nowadays, however, these service providers do not know where and why to deploy a cold room for small-holder farmers. To solve this complex problem, we aim to develop an open-access data-science tool called Coldtivate for both small-holder farmers and cooling service providers in Nigeria.

Publications.

Onwude, D., Motmans, T., Shoji, K., Evangelista, R., Gajardo, J., Odion, D., Ikegwuonu, N., Adekanmbi, O., Hourri, S. and Defraeye, T., 2023. Bottlenecks in Nigeria's fresh food supply chain: What is the way forward?. Trends in Food Science & Technology. DOI

 Celebrating the launch of Your Virtual Cold Chain Assistant (LinkedIn post by BASE)