Pineapple drying factory open in Kayunga.

By Christopher Bendana

Kangulumira, Kayunga

A modern pineapple drying factory is ready to buy and export pineapples from farmers in Kangulumira, Kayunga district.

The Uganda Shilling 1.6 billion factory built by Twiga Sun Fruit since 2021 was officially launched in May at Kamira Village, Kangulumira.

Twiga is working with Kangulumira Vanilla and Horticultural Cooperative Society (KVHCS), a European Union (EU) organic certified fruit producer from the area

The factory processes the pineapples by cutting them into small pieces, dries them in huge oven before packing them ready for export.

Speaking at the launch, Krestin Wolf, a co-founder of Twiga said they started with Kangulumira farmers in Kayunga because they are already certified as organic farmers by the European Union.

“Our niche is organic produce,” she said reminding the farmers to maintain the high quality as needed in the European Union. “No pesticides. Use organic manure like coffee husks.”

Wolf who first came to Uganda in 2019 as a volunteer with Managers Without Borders and worked with All in Trade boasted of a big organic market in the EU, and that sales will be done through the internet.

She advised farmers to do crop rotation to limit the spread of diseases.

Rashid Kabale, the production /export manager KVHCs beseeched the members to keep the quality of the gold from the farm to the mouth.

“This is our gold, keep the quality,” he said

Daniel Neyer, co-founder and a clean energy expert with Neyer Barinworks GmbH, the designer of the factory said the solar system has both electricity and stream totaling about 60kw. This he said is able to run the factory with no interruption of power outage, though there is also a standby generator.’

“It shall be 95% solar,” he revealed.

He said 15kg of fresh pineapples would produce One kg of dry pineapple. The pineapples are kept in the oven for 10 hours.

Mohammed Sebakaki, a pineapple farmer near the factory  implored the government to use part of the funds in the Parish Development Model for investment in similar projects.

Now that the factory is running, Charles Makanga, another farmer, expects better prices for their pineapple produce.

Lubowa Muhammad, the managing director, All in Trade, the company that developed the drying concept with Twiga Sun Fruit and providers of the solar system said the factory can dry 500 kilograms of fresh pineapple per day translating into 30kg of dry pineapples.

He said they were currently working with 300 organic certified farmers from Kangulumira Vanilla and Horticultural Cooperative.

The factory will employ 15 people from processing, drying and packaging.

The factory is the first of its kind in the region, and is a partnership among Kangulumira Pineapples and Vanilla Growers the suppliers of the pineapples, All in Trade who installed the solar system, the designers and the Austrian.

It is surely one of the ways to handle postharvest losses and access to elite markets of the Global North.

Daniel said currently a kilogram of dry pineapples sells at 50 Euros in the European Union.

Support independent science journalism for development  by contacting the editor, cbendana@sciencenowmag.com