The United Kingdom government has announced plans to pump up to £21 million into Africa countries to enhance the continent’s depleted cold chain systems as part of efforts to drive down wastage of agricultural produce and more efficient storage of medicines.

It was announced by the UK’s Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Thérèse Coffey, at a reception in No. 10 Downing Street in London on Thursday night. She said the funding will allow countries in Africa to adequately manage their agricultural and medical products.

“This funding will help developing countries to play their part in tackling climate change and communities across the world with storing food and medicines more efficiently – as well as support farmers to increase their productivity,” said the former UK deputy Prime Minister.

Each developing nation will receive £4 million which will be provided to the United Nations Environment Programme, University of Birmingham, Government of Rwanda and others in the summer through the Defra’s Sustainable Cooling and Cold Chain Solutions programme.

The project is also aimed at introducing modern and more environmentally friendly cold chain systems by replacing outdated air conditioning and cooling refrigeration systems which produce greater amount of harmful emissions.

It is reported that small scale farmers in sub-Saharan Africa are responsible for 80 per cent of food produced but around 37 per cent of the products are lost in between production and consumption, and most 50 per cent of fruits and vegetables are lost due to improper cold chain management.

More than 1.5 million preventable deaths are recorded each year due to lack of cold storage and refrigerated transport vehicles to assist the distribution of medical supplies and vaccines in developing countries – 25 per cent of vaccines are degraded by the time they reach their intended destinations due to lack of cold chains.