KITA, Solar light company and New Energy, all Ghanaian NGOs won the Power Africa Off Grid Energy Challenge round II. KITA has a growing energy department with experts in cookstoves, gasification, biogas and energy efficient practices. In partnership with SNV Netherlands Development Organisation KITA has developed its renewable energy sector to tacke salient development issues in off-grid communities.
KITA with the support of USAID Power Africa Energy challenge will improve the livelihoods of farmers in the Bosome freho district by providing electricity from a gasifier to power agro-processing equipment and lighting in the off-grid community.
Further details below:
Kumasi Institute of tropical agriculture (KITA) is a Ghanaian NGO which serves as a leading center for research, technology transfer and education in farming , agriculture, agribusiness and environmental resources management.
The community of Ohwimase is located in Bosome Freho District of Ashanti Region and has large local industry in the production of palm oil and palm kernel oil. The town has no grid access to electricity and as a result cannot use electrical machinery for processing of their agricultural products. They instead of using traditional energy efficient systems for agricultural processes such as cracking and milling which can take up to 30 hours and consume more than 40 hours of labor. As an alternative, residents travel several kilometres to the nearest town with available electricity.
KITA is addressing the farmers’ issues by procuring and installing a 20 kilowatt gasifier plant to convert the town’s biomass and agriccultural residue into electricity. In addition, KITA will procure processing equipment including a palm kernel cracker, expellere, and oil squeezer to run on the produced electricity and allow the community to process its agricultural products less expensively and more efficiently.