Our Experience at The GeCCo Exhibition Stand during the Africa Climate Summit

By Syprose Ochieng, Jon Leary & Beryl Onjala (Gamos East Africa). Contributors: Danson Ligare (Executive Director of Elite Pongamia Bioenergy Project Ltd); Dorothy Otieno (CEO, of Nyalore Impact); Joyce Kibe (CEO, of PowerPay); Elizabeth Ooro (Head of sales and marketing Mwangaza Light).

On Monday 4th September 2023, world leaders gathered in Nairobi for the historic three-day inaugural Africa Climate Summit to discuss sustainable solutions to global concerns under the theme “Driving Green Growth and Climate Finance Solutions for Africa and the World.” The Summit resulted in the Nairobi Declaration, an eleven-point call to action proclaiming the African States’ united stance on climate action ahead of the 28th United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP28). The summit was attended by approximately 35,000 delegates, including 18 heads of state, UN Secretary-General António Guterres, and European Union President Ursula von der Leyen, with discussions centered on climate action financing, Africa’s green growth agenda, and climate action and economic development.

Along with the summit, organizations, civil societies, and businesses both global, regional, and local had an opportunity to not only engage in the discourse but also to showcase their work at the exhibition area. The newly formed Global eCooking Coalition (GeCCo) hosted eCooking Champions/Partners in Kenya at its booth, together with its anchoring partner organizations. In this blog, we aim to provide highlights of their encounters at the GeCCo stand.  

Danson Ligare (Executive Director of Elite Pongamia Bioenergy Project Ltd) widely known in the e-Cooking Community as the “Ugali (Cornmeal Mush) Man” for his zeal in promoting e-ugali preparation (cooking Ugali using an EPC), was one of the champions at the GeCCo booth. “I appreciate the offers that were given to us, it was beyond what we had requested, which is a good thing. We got the audience; we got the exposure, and it was just powerful”, Danson adds. On Monday afternoon, he was at the booth when Hon. Otichilo, the Governor of Vihiga, stopped by.

Joyce Kibe (CEO, of PowerPay) expressed her appreciation for the chance to display their technologies and products at the exhibition booth. She says they are just pivoting into the technology of clean appliances after previously focusing on solar installations. “It was good to see the other side of green innovation which is power”, Joyce explains. Joyce was able to sell over 10 Tefal digitalized EPCs at the booth and has since gotten an order for 15 EPCs, in addition to interacting with the e-Cooking community. The digitalized EPCs allow distributors to monitor and track the devices sold on PAYGO, and for the users to measure energy consumption and carbon emission reduction in real-time.

They also met with investors interested in investing in their company, and she had just received an email from the investors when we were on the phone with her. She believes the publicity was good for the business and for advocating e-Cooking to a larger audience.

Dorothy Otieno (CEO, of Nyalore Impact), who was also collaborating with Joyce to promote the newly digitalized Tefal EPC via the PowerPay platform, had similar thoughts. Dorothy enthusiastically marketed the EPC with the phrase “Pika na pressure bila pressure na quka digi,” which translates as “cook with pressure without pressure with a digitalized cooker.” she says has tested the marketing slogan and the product. “The response was positive, and I was able to sell EPCs at the exhibition booth.” The EPCs drew many people, which was fun, and I was able to engage with individuals outside of the workplace,” Dorothy said with a grin on her face.

Mwangaza Light‘s head of sales and marketing, Elizabeth Ooro, also remembers her time at the GeCCo stand. She recalls meeting several individuals from other countries, including Nigeria.  She demonstrated their induction cooker, which received positive reviews, and was able to engage with other appliances at the display, such as the institutional EPCs. She had the opportunity to engage with the Burn Manufacturing team who were also showcasing their new ECOA^TM Induction Cooker and exchanged ideas.

She enjoyed the interaction particularly when delegates to the booth inquired about electricity consumption, and cost and received a firsthand response from Irene Wanjohi (Principal Sales Growth Officer – Kenya Power and Lighting Company). Overall, she enjoyed the experience and got to meet the other MECS team members and interact with partners from other platforms and an IGAD team who indicated interest in working together.

“I believe for me being at your booth was awesome as much as we had our booth, but our booth was more of a presentation of only clean energy solutions that we interact with or that we sell out there”. “However, coming to your booth and just focusing on e-Cooking and getting feedback was interesting,” she says. She mentioned that if they get into electric cooking solutions, it would be fascinating to broaden their niche to include commercial or businesses.

The exhibition booth had a significant number of visitors, and additional partners who stopped by included Justin Abuga (Co-founder of ecobora) who is working on electric boilers and institutional solar stoves, among other clean cooking alternatives. We also featured the newly released ECOA^TM Induction Cooker and the ECOA^TM Electric Pressure Cooker by Burn Manufacturing EPCs and Sayona EPCs.

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Featured image, top: Danson Ligare showcasing the digitalized EPC to the Governor of Vihiga, Hon. Otichilo at the GeCCo booth. (Photo credit: Syprose Ochieng).