Sustainable energy for smallholder farmers (SEFFA)

When used in agriculture value chains, the productive use of energy (PUE) can improve smallholder farmers' livelihoods and increase their resilience to climate change, contributing to reducing GHG emissions.

In January 2021, the IKEA Foundation, in partnership with EnDev, started promoting PUE in Ethiopia, Kenya, and Uganda. The programme had a total budget of EUR 8 million and concluded in June 2024.

Background

Smallholder farmers living in Sub-Saharan Africa are earning less than 1.90 USD per day on average. Nearly one-quarter of the population is suffering from malnutrition. At the same time, climate change impacts smallholders in Africa disproportionately due to higher incidences of drought, floods, and average temperature rise. Women and youth often lack access to essential resources like land and financing; in addition, they are often excluded from decision making. However, despite their obligations in the household they contribute 50% to the labour force, mainly processing and selling of produce and products.

In rural regions in Ethiopia, Kenya and Uganda smallholder farmers often use expensive and harmful energy sources which prevent them from efficiently farming and preserving agricultural products. However, the high potential of renewable energy technologies and related energy services for PUE remains widely unused. The lack of access to sustainable and affordable energy technologies and services is the core problem that is addressed by this project.

Solutions and Impact

The project aimed to incorporate the use of renewable energy technologies and services for irrigation, cooling, and drying for smallholder farmers in dairy and horticultural value chains to help achieve increased productivity, improved nutrition, higher incomes, and enhanced climate resilience and food security. The project focused on identifying and piloting scalable, innovative PUE business cases for smallholder farmers and related local businesses. In addition, smallholder farmers, agri-businesses, and solar enterprises received access to solar energy solutions and technological know-how. EnDev ensured the transfer of respective experiences from Kenya and Uganda to Ethiopia.

The business model followed a holistic approach, focusing on the comprehensive improvement of rural livelihoods using PUE technologies. It was expected to improve their nutrition situation, increase resilience to climate change, and contribute to greenhouse gas emission reduction by:

Solar irrigation in the production of fruits and vegetables, including post-harvesting processes,

Solar cooling in the value chain of dairy products, provision of water and feed in dairy, and the use of renewable energy-based cooling systems and solar PV cooling/ice production.

An Innovation fund provided small grants on a competitive basis. It could offer grants up to EUR 22,500 per applicant. These were registered entities with promising business cases that could demonstrate small-scale success stories. At least 25% were the initiatives of women and youth (younger than 35 years).

Project results

Across the three countries, the project achieved the following results:

• Facilitated the sale of 5,809 solar water pumps and established 20 demonstration farms.

• Trained over 373 farmers and reached 52 SHFs through a PAYGO system.

• Increased average income by USD 2,740 and savings by USD 508 for participating SHFs.

• Reduced petrol consumption by 448 liters/year and diesel by 259 liters/year.

• Created 587 jobs and established 12 new distribution channels.

• Piloted solar dryer technologies with 4 local universities and provided 3 Dehytray dryers to V4P&P project members.

• Conducted experience sharing workshops involving 20+ participants.

• Implemented a pilot of solar walk-in cold room (Cooling-as-a-Service) with Growably Agriventures.

• Established 3 PUE demonstration sites for solar cooling and trained 79 people in PUE technologies.

• Dairy businesses that adopted solar-powered deep freezers saw a 135% increase in monthly gross income and achieved 50%+ cost savings on fuel.

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Strong alliance of partners

The IKEA Foundation is an independent philanthropy focused on creating brighter lives on a liveable planet through its grant giving efforts. It is funded by INGKA Foundation, owner of Ingka Group. Learn more at ikeafoundation.org.

EnDev is co-managed by the Netherlands Enterprise Agency (RVO) and the German International Cooperation Agency (GIZ). For this project, a number of implementing organisations are contracted, with the SNV Netherlands Development Organisation being one of the most prominent implementation partners of EnDev.