Improving energy efficiency in Kenya’s tea factories
The tea industry is a major employer in Kenya, with three million people working in the sector. The Kenya Tea Development Agency (KTDA) is a national farmer organisation that manages 70 tea factories in the country on behalf of 650,000 small-scale farmers.
The context
The tea industry is a major employer in Kenya, with three million people working in the sector. The Kenya Tea Development Agency (KTDA) is a national farmer organisation that manages 70 tea factories in the country on behalf of 650,000 small-scale farmers. Collectively they produce a significant amount of Kenya’s tea.
Typically energy use accounts for over 50% of the cost of tea production, and prices are rising. Many factories use old equipment and don’t have good energy management policies in place, so there is scope to support them to operate more efficiently.
Our aims
Our aim is to reduce energy consumption, CO2 emissions and costs in KTDA’s tea factories.
ETP has a long-standing partnership with GIZ and KTDA to deliver climate change and energy efficiency initiatives in Kenya.
Our impact
We have made real progress in our energy efficiency initiatives in Kenya. Together with GIZ, our energy efficiency programme supported tea factories to improve their energy efficiency, reduce their fuelwood use and ultimately reduce their carbon emissions.
We also developed and ran specialised training for staff at all levels in the factories, bespoke to the issues at their place of work. By embedding understanding, we encourage long-term commitment to energy-efficiency initiatives.
Global reach
Across Malawi, Rwanda and Kenya, ETP-supported nurseries encouraged the planting of trees to help combat carbon emissions, as did work with factories in Kenya to reduce their energy emissions.
From 2016 to 2020, 180,000 - 300,000 trees were saved a year through factory energy efficiencies. Close to half a million trees were planted over this time frame, and 20,000+ tonnes of carbon emissions were avoided each year.
Across Asia, we are also supporting the tea industry to reduce its energy consumption and CO2 emissions. Driving long-term change, we convene factory CEOs to engage with energy-efficiency issues. To date, major tea factories across Indonesia and Sri Lanka have collectively committed to energy saving plans.
Find out more
Read more about how we’re supporting farmers to become more resilient to climate change in Kenya here.
Take a look at ETP’s resources to learn more about our environmental programmes. The manual Mitigating Climate Change in the tea sector helps factories and farmers reduce energy consumption and climate emissions.
Distributing food aid via our Community Empowerment Programme in Assam
Rhoda is a member of a community savings scheme and has been saving to build her house. She says:
