Starting Tuesday, Nairobi will serve as the venue for the Sankalp Africa Summit, a three-day event uniting entrepreneurs, investors, and policy leaders around the theme ‘South–South Rising.’
Taking place from February 25 to 26 in Nairobi, the forum reinforces the city’s status as a regional center for discussions on business development and climate adaptation.
Prior to the main summit, Energy Catalyst, an Innovate UK initiative, will conduct a three-day exhibition from February 24 to 26, highlighting prominent African clean-energy enterprises. According to organizers, this exhibition offers an early chance for investors, policymakers, and entrepreneurs to connect with cutting-edge technologies before the complete summit commences on February 25.
The organization will also lead a major session titled ‘Energy as Infrastructure for Agriculture – Powering Food Systems,’ showcasing innovators with commercialized technologies that enhance productivity, minimize post-harvest losses, and provide dependable cold-chain solutions.
A central element of this year’s summit is a display of clean energy and climate technological innovations designed to broaden access to clean, affordable, and dependable energy in underserved marketsa persistent issue throughout much of sub-Saharan Africa.
Among the anticipated solutions drawing investor interest are solar-powered milling systems engineered to decrease fuel expenses in staple food processing. Developers assert that substituting diesel-powered mills could reduce operational costs for smallholder farmers and rural businesses.
Industrial decarbonization will also receive significant focus, featuring biomass-to-energy systems that transform agricultural waste into heat and electricity for tea factories and other processors searching for alternatives to wood fuel and fossil fuels.
Within the fisheries sector, solar-battery microgrids marketed as ‘GoHubs’ will be presented for their capacity to deliver ice production, cold storage, and refrigerated transportation services to artisanal fishing communities in Mozambique, where inconsistent electricity supplies contribute to post-harvest losses.
The exhibition will additionally present pay-as-you-go induction stoves targeting off-grid and peri-urban households, with the objective of broadening access to electric cooking through adaptable financing arrangements.
Africa confronts one of the planet’s most substantial energy access deficiencies, with approximately 600 million people without electricity and over a billion lacking clean cooking solutions.
As reported by the World Bank and the Institute of Economic Affairs, these deficiencies restrict economic advancement, limit educational and healthcare opportunities, and impede small businesses and industrial progress.
The World Bank indicates that increasing energy demand fueled by population growth and industrialization, combined with the disproportionate effects of climate change in Africa, has rendered the clean energy transition imperative.
Analysts emphasize that addressing these deficiencies through clean energy represents both a development requirement and a climate necessity, delivering economic, social, and environmental advantages throughout the continent.