Vertical Gardens
Ukulima Tech believes that a healthy, organic, and sustainable lifestyle can be achieved through their Vertical Gardens. The Vertical Garden provides consumers with the ability to grow their vegetables and herbs with minimal inputs of water, labor, and land space.
In Nairobi, more than 4 million people are affected by food insecurity challenges. Ukulima Tech's mission is to combat food scarcity in Kenya, in Nairobi in particular. Ukulima Tech believes that vertical gardens can ensure that urban households can live a sustainable, organic, and healthy lifestyle by producing their herbs and vegetables.
Ukulima Tech
Ukulima Tech aims to promote a sustainable, healthy, and organic lifestyle through its innovation - the vertical gardens.The vertical garden is an innovation that seeks to promote urban farming in a country where there’s a scarcity of land in the city center. The vertical gardens can be seen as a new revolutionized method for food production for urban households. The innovation itself entails that consumers can plant herbs and vegetables of their choosing in their backyard, verandah, and balconies.
The Vertical gardens are very easy to use and are low maintenance, which makes it easy for every household to grow their vegetables and herbs with little to no experience. Thus, this innovation has revolutionized food production in Kenya and can ensure that its consumers can live a healthy, sustainable, and organic lifestyle while consuming nutritious food.
The next step
CFIA students from the minor FI4SGD helped Ukulima Tech with their next step, which was how to frugalize their innovation for low-income households. The project included making a business model for the enterprise where the main focus is to make a marketing strategy but also a business plan for the upcoming years. Moreover, in terms of frugalization, the design of the vertical gardens was adjusted to ensure a more sustainable innovation. Lastly, CFIA students studied the social impact of the innovation to analyze the impact on gender, environment, but also on sustainability.
Sustainable Global Development
The research project initiated by Ukulima Tech aims to investigate how their Vertical Gardens can advance towards the UN Sustainable Development Goal 2 (zero hunger)
One of the main sustainable development goals that Ukulima Tech is working on is to achieve “Zero Hunger”. Ukulima Tech’s mission is to ensure that its consumers can live a healthy, organic, and sustainable lifestyle and consume herbs and vegetables that are nutritious and organic. Therefore, Ukulima Tech is working hard on combating food scarcity, which is a prevalent issue that affects the majority of Kenya. Thus, if households adopt this innovation, it can ensure a more healthy, sustainable, and organic lifestyle.
Project Team
Ukulima Tech
Elizabeth Achieng, Ukulima Tech Kenya
Sheila Suluve, Ukulima Tech Kenya
Partner organizations
What Design Can Do - WDCD
Academic Supervisor
Dr. André Leliveld (Leiden University)
Student Research Team
Dylan Clementia (Leiden University – International Relations)
Rebecca Baugh (TU Delft – Architecture)
Alesha Wong (Erasmus University – Economics and Business economics)