IoT enabled cold chain for Kenya and Uganda fish market

Fish is the main animal protein for 30% of Africans. Fishing provides employment and livelihood for 9.6% of the Kenyan population and represents 1.5% GDP in Uganda. Although the fishing industry is growing in East African countries (EAC), the post-harvest and distribution losses are 56% due to the lack of cooling. In response, our project will develop a smart cooling container (SCC) equipped with modular-swappable-rechargeable cooling thermal energy storage (coolth batteries) and adopting IoT sensing technology to monitor the fish supply chain in real-time. The IoT-SCC will be mountable on motorbikes, a popular food transportation tool in EAC. We will investigate connecting the IoT-SCC with the broader food supply chain through the internet, allowing real-time information to integrate smallholder fishers with the entire fish supply chain. IoT-SCC is innovative, inexpensive, minimise fish losses, improve smallholder incomes, and improves food security in the region. It can be adopted for vaccine transportation.