Key Pillars

The Key Pillars of Clean Cooling enabling us to reach our vision

The key pillars support the Clean Cooling strategy and initiatives in order to achieve our goal of... An integrated programme to accelerate the deployment of sustainable cold-chain solutions in developing markets at scale with fit-for-market business models and clean technologies.

How do you create the local and global “field to fork” connectivity to nutritiously feed 10 billion people in 2050, whilst economically empowering hundreds of millions of small-scale farmers whose livelihoods and well-being are often dependent on only 1-2 hectares of land or less, as well as ensure they are climate-change adaptation ready and resilient.… sustainably?

Key Pillars Explained

Our 9 pillars support the continual development of People, Environment, and Culture across the Clean Cooling Network.

Clean Cooling Key Pillars

Capacity Building & Training

  • Training for farmers and co-operatives
  • Training for community mobilisers
  • Training for cold-chain engineers
  • Training for policymakers and financial institutions
  • Development of the SPOKEs network and CoE programme in India
  • Cold-chains through the GESI lens
  • Undergraduate and postgraduate degrees

Visit our Academy to view all training and professional development opportunities: Clean Cooling Academy

Finance & Business Models

  • Financeable Business Models and deployment approaches
  • Inclusive Financing Mechanisms, including blended finance solutions
  • Return on Investment Model (social benefits) to underpin government’s investments

Review Business models available to help finance your cold-chain initiatives: Clean Cooling Models & Tools

System Design & Modelling

  • Peer-reviewed data collection tools
  • Horizon scanning
  • Virtual modelling
  • Telemetrics and data collection
  • Next-generation vaccine cold-chain infrastructure and systems
  • Agrifood system testing from soil to fork (SMART FARM plus Cold-chain campus) 

Review models and toolkits to help analyse your cold-chain requirements: Clean Cooling Toolkits

Technology Innovation & Demonstration

  • Climate resilience
  • Build and demonstrate off-grid Community Cooling Hubs
  • Testing new technologies
  • On-farm pre-cooling
  • Off-grid, low GWP, efficient solutions through the cold-chain
  • Off-grid vaccine cold-chain incl. ultra-cold
  • Development of protocols for testing food safety and vaccine efficacy, and energy efficiency
  • Support to existing technologies, including transition to efficient, low GWP alternatives
  • Demonstrating new technologies (including through the SPOKEs and Try Before You Buy (TBYB)
  • Lifecycle management
  • Demonstration and sales channels for innovators

One Health & Resilience

Integrating sustainable cooling and cold-chain technologies within a One Health framework ensures that vaccines, diagnostics, seeds, foods, and wildlife samples retain their integrity from “farm to family” and back into environmental monitoring. One Health focuses on 4 key sub-pillars:

  1. Immunisation Systems & Cold-chain Innovation

    This theme links vaccine potency for humans and animals with sustainable cooling, ensuring equitable coverage and zoonotic disease prevention under One Health.

  2. Seed Systems, Agricultural and Farming Resilience

    Applying cold-chain and cryopreservation to seed banking, post-harvest management and biospecimen banking safeguards agrobiodiversity, farmer livelihoods, and ecosystem health.

  3. Food and Nutrition Security & Dietary Health

    Ensuring nutrient-rich foods reach consumers safely by leveraging ambient temperature stabilisation and sustainable cold-chain solutions.

  4. Health System Resilience & Diagnostic Infrastructure

    Building climate-resilient labs and environmental surveillance capacity backed by sustainable cooling to detect, prevent, and respond to health threats across species.

Enabling policies & thought leadership

  • Promotion and adoption of a holistic, systems-based approach
  • Risk radar and cold-chain security index
  • Public, private community partnership financing
  • Cooling as critical infrastructure
  • Expansion of the Global Vision through a reference approach
  • New strategies for energy savings and energy efficiency e.g. increasing the set point for frozen food by three degrees
  • GESI - The programme is underpinned by a cross-cutting Gender Equality and Social Inclusion (GESI)  workstream to include a comprehensive framework, tools, training, monitoring and evaluation.

Market Needs & Consumer Behaviour

Tools under development to better understand local market needs, value addition opportunities for smallholder farmers, and consumer behaviour to tailor solutions and strategies.

More to follow…

Energy Transition

  • Energy Transition and Access (including electrification of transport strategies)
  • Integrated energy services (including integration of renewable energy, waste heat and cold, and thermal energy storage)

Manufacturing & Assembly

We are developing in-country assembly and manufacturing capabilities to complement training activities, build local capacity, and improve the accessibility and availability of cooling technologies.

More to follow…

Network News

The latest from the global Clean Cooling community

Festival of Cooling Competition: OPEN NOW

As part of the Festival of Cooling, the Clean Cooling Network invites you to take part in a photography competition that shines a light on how cooling manifests in our day-to-day life, whether that's through food, health, nature or technology.

COMPETITION ANNOUNCEMENT - Turn your creativity into impact at the Festival of Cooling

Two official pre-festival competitions will give visual storytellers and innovators a chance to put their perspectives and products in front of an audience that matters: the “Photography Competition” and the “Startup Pitch Competition”.

There’s something for everyone at the Festival of Cooling – Making the Invisible Visible

From 6th – 10th October 2025, the Festival of Cooling in Kigali, Rwanda, will be the go-to event exploring one of the most powerful yet underrated forces that is silently shaping the future of cooling.

View all news

Events & Webinars

Exclusive lectures and workshops from the Clean Cooling team and partners.

Festival of Cooling Day 1 - Focus on Farmers outreach

Connecting smallholder farmers, cooperatives, and agri-entrepreneurs to practical post-harvest cooling solutions. Sessions will focus on reducing losses, accessing finance, and adopting technologies that improve food quality and profitability. Join us on the 6th of October.

Festival of Cooling Day 2 - Focus on the Health Sector

Spotlighting the life-saving role of cold-chains in healthcare, enabling safe storage and delivery of vaccines, blood, and antivenoms. Health workers, planners, and logisticians will gain tools, insights, and networks to strengthen health cold-chains. Join us on the 7th of October.

Festival of Cooling Day 3 - Focus on Schools & Education

Engaging the next generation of innovators and decision-makers through hands-on learning, storytelling, and creative experimentation. Students will explore real-world cooling challenges and explore careers in sustainable cooling, logistics, and climate action. Join us on the 8th of October.

Festival of Cooling Day 4 - Focus on Creatives, Startups & Innovation Hubs

Celebrating creativity, entrepreneurship, and the fusion of art and science. This will provide a launchpad for bold ideas, showcase innovations, and inspire youth-led problem-solving for climate-smart cold-chains. Join us on the 9th of October.

Festival of Cooling Day 5 - Focus on High-level Stakeholders & Policymakers

Setting the strategic tone, aligning government, finance, academia, and industry partners around a shared policy and investment roadmap for resilient, just, and climate-aligned cold-chains in Africa. Join us on the 10th of October.

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