Country MOU signed PURE Power Uganda
Uganda — dairy first, with EHCAI in Mbarara.
PURE Power Uganda starts with dairy in the southwest: solar milk-chilling units at cooperative collection centers, priced per liter, with a light base at Excel Hort Consult Agribusiness Incubator's (EHCAI) Kashari campus in Mbarara. Uganda shares the East African Community customs union with the Burundi base, so equipment, spares and trainers move overland.
Country program of PURE Power Africa with Excel Hort Consult Agribusiness Incubator (EHCAI), Mbarara, a member institution of the African Agribusiness Incubators Network (AAIN) and its intended lead member for Uganda. Program instruments are entered into by Gigawatt Burundi S.A.
At a glance
Figures are indicative, drawn from World Bank World Development Indicators, national energy compacts and national statistics, latest available year; full sources on request.
- Population
- 51.4 million (2025)
- Rural population
- 68% (2025)
- Agriculture in employment
- 65% (2025)
- Electricity access, national
- ≈55–60% (2024–2025)
- Electricity access, rural
- ≈43–45% (2024–2025)
- Clean cooking access
- ≈2% strict definition; 25% including improved stoves (2025)
- Currency
- Ugandan shilling (UGX); mature mobile-money market
- Languages
- English, Swahili; Luganda and regional languages
1Instruments in place
- Memorandum of understanding between Gigawatt Burundi S.A. and Excel Hort Consult Agribusiness Incubator (EHCAI), Mbarara, signed at Bujumbura
- Alignment with the Generating Growth Opportunities and Productivity for Women Enterprises (GROW) program and the Parish Development Model for youth and women in agribusiness
2Network lead member
Excel Hort Consult Agribusiness Incubator
A Ugandan agribusiness incubation and enterprise-development organization based in Mbarara, working across East Africa with government institutions, development partners, universities, research organizations, farmer organizations and the private sector. It brings the incubation and acceleration methodology, trainer certification, quality standards and the relationships with the ministries of Agriculture, Water and Environment, Trade, Education and the Office of the Prime Minister.
3The first units: dairy
About a fifth of Uganda's milk is lost after milking, most of it at collection and bulking, and many collection centers chill on diesel.
- Two milk-chilling units. Light chilling-service units of 30–35 kWp at cooperative milk collection centers, each designed for about 4,000 liters a day in the flush season — Isingiro first, Kiruhura in parallel. Chilling is priced per liter, designed to cost less than diesel.
- A light base at Kashari. At EHCAI's campus in Mbarara: workshop, spares, the refrigeration technician and training, on 15–25 kWp.
- Operated and maintained by the hub. Whether a cooperative or the hub owns the chiller, the hub operates and maintains it and is paid per liter.
- Gates. Each unit opens on signed service agreements with the host cooperative, a site agreed with the district authorities, and community consent.
4Agriculture and value chains
Matooke, cassava, maize, coffee, sweet potato, beans, millet and dairy. Coffee exports earned about US$2.2 billion in 2024/25. Maize losses after harvest run at 17.6%; matooke is highly perishable with little formal processing; about a fifth of milk is lost after milking, most of it at collection and bulking. Milk chilling, milling, drying, cold rooms and coffee-washing capacity are the first services.
5Energy compact and regulation
Uganda's National Energy Compact targets 85% electricity access by 2030 (rural 75%), some 2,700 mini-grid sites, six million solar home systems and half the population on modern cooking solutions. Hubs are developed under the Electricity Act and the Electricity (Isolated Grid Systems) Regulations, 2020; the public distribution utility, which took over distribution operations on 1 April 2025, is distributor and partner.
6Counterpart institutions
- Energy
- Ministry of Energy and Mineral Development; Electricity Regulatory Authority; Uganda Electricity Distribution Company; Uganda Energy Credit Capitalisation Company
- Agriculture
- Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries; Ministry of Water and Environment
- Finance
- Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development
7Programs the hubs can attach to
- Electricity Access Scale-up Project (World Bank)
- Energising Development (multi-donor) productive-use and clean-cooking components
- Uganda Energy Credit Capitalisation Company results-based financing windows
- ASCENT-GREEN distributed renewable energy program (Green Climate Fund, World Bank)
- GROW program and the Parish Development Model
8What is different here
- East African Community: one customs union with the Burundi base — equipment, spares and trainers move overland without a second import regime.
- A denser, more reliable road network than the region's average eases hub-to-hub logistics; a mature mobile-money market shortens the path to hub-based credit.
9How deployment runs
The first two chilling units and the Kashari base open on their gates. Wave 1 adds chilling and processing points in the same dairy corridor around Mbarara; later waves extend to adjacent districts and other value chains. Trainers prepared at the Rusi campus and with Ugandan vocational institutions staff the hubs from the start.
10Next step
Engagement runs through Excel Hort Consult Agribusiness Incubator in Mbarara and the Bujumbura headquarters.
A country launch-phase package — site assessment, equipment configuration against local crops and volumes, the partner and program map, and a funding roadmap built on programs already financed in the country — is prepared jointly with the country member for an interested government or funder.