Nigerian Startup, ColdHubs Limited has emerged winner of the United Nations Industrial Development Organization UNIDO Global Call for “Innovative Ideas and Technologies vs. COVID-19 and beyond” in the Food and Agriculture category.
The winners of the UNIDO Global Call were announced on July 14, 2020 in a virtual conference with ColdHubs winning in one of the 4 categories out of 1100 applications submitted from 108 countries around the world.
According to an official statement on the UNIDO website, “The winners of the four strategic categories of the Global Call were identified based on the vote of a jury comprised of internal and external experts. Due to the close vote from the jury, two winners were identified for the Health Emergency category, while one winner was identified for each of the other three categories”
With ColdHubs winning in the food and agriculture category, ECO4CO and Indoor real-time dynamic air & object surface disinfection are the two winners in the Health Emergency category, while EcoWorth Tech and Plasticpreneur won in the Energy & Environment and Resilient Industries & Infrastructure categories respectively.
ColdHubs Limited who installs and operates 100% solar powered walk-in cold storage facilities that has the ability of increasing the shelf lives of fruits and vegetables from 2 to more than twenty days, took to their social media platforms to break the news, saying; “We wish to announce that ColdHubs has emerged winners of the #UNIDOGlobalCall in the Food and Agriculture Category. We are grateful to the organizers and the entire UNIDO team. We also appreciate the support of our partners, clients and everyone who has been with us”
Bernardo Calzadilla-Sarmiento, UNIDO’s Managing Director, Directorate of Digitalization, Technology and Agri-business, opened the award ceremony, saying; “UNIDO is stepping up its efforts and working with its Member States and other UN agencies to support developing countries to first respond to the crisis, and then recover better, building more equal, sustainable and resilient economies through Inclusive and Sustainable Industrial Development”.
Winners of the UNIDO Global Call will be provided with advisory and mentorship services through the organization's Investment and Technology Promotion Offices ITPOs as well as an opportunity to showcase their innovative solutions at the EuroScience Open Forum 2020 (ESOF2020) and Expo Dubai 2021.