New projects strengthen UK-South Africa innovation cooperation

Scaling Out For Impact (SOFI-2) Round 2: Announcing Winners

Up to £500,000 of joint funding from Innovate UK and the South Africa Technology Innovation Agency (TIA) has been allocated to fund nine innovative projects under the SOFI-2 initiative that will be delivered through exciting partnerships across the UK and South Africa.

SolAquaFusion: Hybrid Aquaponics for Food, Energy, and Water

Partnership: EcoTechX and Jwale Corporations

Aquaponics systems in South Africa currently rely on grid electricity and municipal water sources, which limits their scalability and accessibility, particularly in remote areas with unreliable infrastructure. This project aims to develop a self-sustained aquaponics system that operates independently of external water and energy sources, making it suitable for remote or off-grid locations. A novel solar-powered atmospheric water generator (Solar2Water) will be combined with aquaponics to create a closed-loop system that doesn’t rely on external energy, water resources, or infrastructure.

PlasmaReNu: Renewable Energy – Cold Plasma Technology for Off-Grid Industrial Water Treatment

Partnership: ANAMAD Ltd. and NexClean

The project is focused on the validation of a novel advanced energy-efficient water decontamination process in the real industrial environment of a water treatment plan in Easter Cape province. The innovative autonomous cold plasma water treatment unit will be designed and powered by a renewable solar energy source. The proposed water treatment method is based on the atmospheric (“cold”) nonthermal plasma (NTP) process. It is the first three-dimensional NTP directly generated in the water volume by high voltage pulsed electrical discharge.

Smart Soil: Strengthening water & food security using environmental monitoring & frass

Partnership: FlyBox (Mana Bio Systems) and FarmRu

A collaborative project to produce an organic fertiliser that is optimized for water retention utilising frass along with an environmental monitoring system that can track and control water use in farming operations, allowing for dynamic decision making.

The project aims to address the critical need for water-efficient agriculture in South Africa by improving farmer decision-making on fertiliser and irrigation, streamlining processes into a single decision point.

Access to Aquaponics & Feed with Renewables

Partnership: Barefoot Lightning and House Harvest

The project aims to unleash aquaponics into the wider community by developing content and tools to drive awareness and ease to build and operate aquaponics system. A key enabler will be the creation of sustainable low-cost feed production for aquaponics; incorporating low-cost renewables for energy and heat into the aquaponics system. The project will offer a full aquaponics system and platform for easy uptake and implementation focusing on nutrition and high-value crops that are defined by the local farmers in the provinces. This will be supported through a platform to learn, monitor, access funding and implement an aquaponics system.

Nexus: Bhek Indalo

Partnership: Farmer Charlie and Kasi Gas

The project aims to convert organic waste into sustainable Biogas and Organic fertilizer, reducing risks of water pollution thanks to smart sensors. By utilising waste efficiently and monitoring its byproduct and water pollution, the project aims to promote sustainable energy, sustainable farming, clean water in a cost-effective solution. The partnership will also allow to validate the efficiency of organic fertilizer (byproduct of biogas) created by Kasi Gas with Farmer Charlie’s sensors measuring soil humidity, temperature, and NPK. The sensors will also guide in smart spraying of fertilisers.

Cool Milk and Sharp Prices

Partnership: Concept Dairy and Agri Business Network

The project solving for two core challenges impacting SA dairy farmers – i) farmers’ inability to keep their milk cool, resulting in an inability to sell their milk into commercial market streams; ii) inequitable, unsustainable prices for milk

Electrification through off-grid solutions to cooling to extend shelf-life of milk up to 96 hours is being designed and tested with a small group of dairy farmers. They will also access and test the Concept Dairy price transparency solution which will be partnering with the Agri Business Network App that is accessed by over 13,000 farmers locally offers the knowledge and information on milk prices locally. The goal is to be able to reach and sign-up all 700 existing commercial dairy farmers in South Africa.

Sanzone Agrivoltaics: Moloto Sanzone Agrivoltaic Garden

Partnership: Tecrea Ltd. and Umbane Energy Investments

The project integrates renewable energy with agriculture, optimizing land use. The proposal is to test a vertical bifacial solar configuration argivoltaic system with a proprietary software for system analysis. The plants being grown and tested in the garden will be crops fortified by the Sanzone TM nanotechnology. The Sanzone TM nanotechnology leverages antimicrobial polymers to improve resistance and increase yield with reduced input costs.

Agri-Energy Intergation: Dual-use grass for biofuel and protein production

Partnership: Micrea Ltd. and AGR Smart Tech

The project aims to harness the dual potential of high-yield, drought-resistant grasses like Bana grass and Moringa oleifera as sources of biofuel and protein, while using soil sensors to optimise growing conditions. Microwave-assisted biomass conversion technology will be used to transform the grasses into renewable bioenergy and protein-rich animal feed. There is potential to explore the protein for human consumption as well. The project also has the potential to contribute to climate change mitigation through carbon sequestration and displacement of fossil fuels with renewable energy.

Aqua-Skies: Impact of ‘Aqua-Skies’ on water usage in farming

Partnership: AQSEN Innovations Ltd and Drone Eye Technology

Combining drone technology and Internet of Things (IoT) enable sensors to offer more efficient determination of problems within water supplies for agriculture, including aquaculture.

The aim is to be able to do aerial sampling and testing to monitor water quality in real time to take information decisions, faster intervention and timely remediation. The drones and sensors can also assist in finding the precise point of water contamination to ensure timely interventions for better farm management practices.

Watch this space as we follow these projects progress over the next eight months and address key challenges in Limpopo, Mpumalanga and Easter Cape provinces.

SOFI-2 is co-funded and delivered by Innovate UK and strategic partner Technology Innovation Agency (TIA) in South Africa. It is delivered through the Global Alliance Africa project as part of the collaboration research and development initiatives.