Our initial planning did not have any return on investment due to the huge cost of solar panels. Therefore we embarked on the journey to look for opportunities, to improve our ROI. We began searching for reputable companies that specialise in financed solar solutions throughout Africa and came across SolarAfrica. They provide complete energy solutions for companies wanting an alternative to grid or diesel (to learn more about SolarAfrica and how they did this with SMA and Harmonics Systems, visit (http://www.solarafrica.com/commercial-solar/#commercial-videos)

In June 2013, the Government of Japan, and the Government of Kenya established a Joint Crediting Mechanism (JCM) . The  Global Environment Centre (GEC) Foundation works on environmental issues of global importance with many countries to promote investment and deployment of low carbon technologies, products, systems etc. We applied for a grant to the GEC and were fortunate to receive it, hence commenced the initiation of the prestigious project.

The biggest challenge we faced when trying to get this project of the ground was getting licenses and approvals from the County government. Seeing as how this was a new endeavor for a remote location, there were no measures in place regarding what permits or fees were required. Thanks to lots of resilience liaising with the various ministries and government departments we did finally iron out a license agreement and fees. We did learn that when trying something new, getting approvals early is critical.

Now that the project is complete we expect to find that our power supply is stable, our air is cleaner, and our electricity costs are lowered (by 22%). We also expect to see other projects like this become more frequent in the area as a foundation has now been set and people in the area now have experience working on projects like this.

Visit SolarAfrica’s website http://www.solarafrica.com/

Read SMA’s Press Release here http://www.sma.de/newsroom/aktuelle-nachrichten/news-detail/news/16058-pv-hybrid-system-von-sma-senkt-die-stromkosten-in-ostafrikas-groesster-salzfabrik.html

Common salt (Sodium Chloride) is produced all over the world either by solar evaporation or through mining. At Krystalline Salt Ltd, salt harvesting is purely through solar evaporation,  in the sense that no chemicals are added during the production of salt. The whole operation mainly depends on solar evaporation along with the regulation of the flow of brine through a series of evaporators, condensers, and crystallizers.

Water is moved to evaporators and condensers. Here the water gets evaporated by the sun leaving behind a concentrated solution known as brine.

4 months later (depending on the weather) whats left in the evaporators and condensers are sparkly shimmering salt crystals which are harvested and loaded onto trucks. We call these salt crystallizers.

crystalllizers

The trucks transport the freshly harvested salt to the factory where it is washed and stored as a giant heap.

The salt is then moved into the factory where it is washed again (except for our Coarse Salt), sprayed with iodine, crushed, dried, and sorted by size.

The salt then moves onto our packing section where it is packed and loaded for transport to its various destinations.

And that is the basics. Other processes include managing and maintaining salinity levels, microorganism levels, and quality.

“Well sure, salt is food so…”

“But we grow a bunch of fruits and vegetables”

“What?! Why?!”

“Sustainability my friend, sustainability.”

At Krystalline Salt, we encourage all our employees to have kitchen gardens. A kitchen garden is a little garden you would have to grow items you use the most in order to minimize spending.

The agriculture department however, do something a little more unique. They maintain farms and plantations to sustain employees with food. That’s right, we grow food for our employees. But that’s not all. The agriculture department spends time researching new ways and methods to grow food that doesn’t typically grow in the area. They also conduct research on creating natural fertilizers of varying strengths to aid development of different types of crops. Have a look at our gallery.

Besides the sponsorship directly benefiting the student in question, the families or foster families indirectly benefit by having more money to spend on basics such as food and water. Additionally, the stress due to uncertainty regarding budgetary and financial concerns is also alleviated allowing the families in question to lead more prosperous and productive lives.

We have also established an Out-Grower program with local farmers to grow trees. We currently have more than 86 local farmers who have been engaged. The seedlings are provided by us. Until now, over 7,404 casuarina trees have been planted by the Out-Grower farmers.

We have also managed to plant more trees this year by making an agreement with Marereni Primary and Secondary schools to plant casuarina trees along their boundaries. We have planted approximately 1,940 casuarina trees within the schools’ compounds.

Through the tree planting program, we have also engaged the locals (both individuals and saccos) in maintaining casuarina tree nurseries. We provide seeds and seedling bags to the farmers, and when the seedlings mature for transplanting we buy them, there by providing a source of income to the community.

Read More About Our Out-Growers Profram

Our Out-Growers Program

We have a technical team that assists local farmers in understanding how to grow and take care of their cash crop. Staff and community are encouraged to have a kitchen garden so as to have food security. Our salt is also iodized to prevent goiter and improve brain development in children.

Learn About Our Agriculture Department Here

Our Agriculture Department

Since 2012, we have built an in-house dispensary at the refinery in Gongoni. This provides all employees access to free primary health care. It also encourages health-promoting behavior in order to strengthen our workforce. In 2015 all staff went through health related training, example HIV awareness. In 2017, we will expand the clinic to take care of different kinds of ailments. In addition we make efforts to bring specialist medical clinics (example Eye clinic, jiggers clinic etc) annually, for the community and staff . Here, community members are treated and operated on by specialized doctors on site.

Learn About How Our Salt Is Made

How Salt Is Made… An Overview

Read About The Maternity Ward We Built.

For the soon to be mothers of Magarini Constituency

Read About The Medical Camp We Sponsored In Nyeri

A look at Nyeri’s health

We Once Sponsored A Football Tournament. Read About It Here.

The KK Patel Cup

In 1988, KK Patel primary school was built. In 2003 an additional administration block and 15 more classrooms were built to accommodate 1000 students. Krystalline provided desks for all classrooms as well as a water tank. Since December 2013 the company through its Chairman, contribute towards school furniture and stationary in the value of Kes 500,000/-. Since 2014, we have started a bursary program for Secondary school students who have good results.  Since 2014, we’ve had an internship program, that allows new graduates to experience real work. We have had success in this program as many have joined us after they’ve complete their schooling. Annually we have thousands of students from schools visiting the factory to learn about the science behind making edible salt.

Learn How Our Salt Is Made

How Salt Is Made… An Overview

Learn More About The Students We Sponsor

Student Sponsorship

Read More About Books, Furniture and Stationary We Have Given to Schools.

Books and Desks for educational accomadations

Read More About The School We Built

A brighter future for kids in Marereni

We have made serious commitments to involve women in our practices. 15% of senior management are women; 30% of our staff in the refinery are women. For the community related projects example growing trees etc, we encourage female participation.

Read about our preparations for International Women’s Day here

International Women’s Day

Read About Our Partnership With The Girl Child Network.

The Girl Child Network are Awesome

Learn About How We Helped Single Mothers in Meru

Meru Mum’s

We have invested in water conservation techniques by circulating our effluence and using the same in our refinery. We built a dam in February 2012 in Dodoni area. One of the staff donated two acres of his farm for the construction of the dam. This dam serves about 10,000 villagers in nine villages namely Midodoni A and B, Mandokeni, Kadzuhoni, Dodoma, Msambweni, Karimapaka and Mbuyu wa Kombo. Animals also quench their thirst by drinking at the dam. In 2013 we invested in a Reverse Osmosis plant. This provides clean drinking water to all our staff and the local community. Over 10,000 people collect drinking water per month for free.

Learn More About Mineral Water

Mineral Water is awesome

We continue to invest in environmentally sustainable electricity options and infrastructure that reduces our carbon footprint. Our refinery uses bio-thermal boilers hence reducing the carbon usage. We will be investing in renewable, efficient sources of power using solar energy that will be implemented in 2017. We continue to educate staff. In 2014 we gifted solar lamps to our staff so that they learn to conserve electricity additionally in 2015 they each received energy saving jikos which only uses 6 piece of charcoal all day and does not create any fumes.

Read about our latest solar project at our main plant.

By The Power Of Solar

Our family of employees are our biggest asset. We continue to grow our team by converting all casuals to permanent staff. Housing with free security, clean water and electricity is provided to all staff. Continuous training programs are in place for the staff to improve their skills. All staff are involved in the Kaizen projects.

Learn More About Our Staff

Our Staff And Friends

We continue to annualy engage with governments in addressing infrastructure challenges and support in the education and health programs.

Learn How Our Salt Is Made

How Salt Is Made… An Overview

We have provided targeted internships for young people from disadvantaged backgrounds in order to promote social mobility whilst also enhancing company performance through increased workforce diversity.

Learn About How We Helped Single Mothers In Meru

Meru Mum’s

Learn About Our Annual Christmas Event

Christmas with Krystalline 2015

Engage in industry collaborations which bring greater connectivity, energy efficiency and safety to urban communities. We strive to build with nature (i.e. natural or green infrastructure) to create societal and ecological value whilst optimizing operational efficiencies.

Read About our Agriculture Department

Our Agriculture Department

We continue to improve the efficiency of physical facilities and processes in regards to the use of energy, water, and other resources. Efforts to increase and advance supply chain transparency and accountability initiatives are in place. We make efforts to reduce wastage of raw materials used whenever possible by reusing or recycling existing materials.

Our TWO MILLION Trees initiative is a goal that we do not shy away from. The climate and soil is not our best friends in this initiative however our teams are motivated to continue with there efforts. To date we have grown 1.2 million trees. Our procurement process is very strict and we purchase equipment that reduces green house gas.

Learn About Our Out-Growers Program

Our Out-Growers Program

We have Implemented improved treatment systems to ensure any waste water produced during manufacturing is properly recycled back into the refinery and not released into the natural environment.

Learn About Mangrove Restoration

2006-2007 Mangrove Restoration Effort

We continue to implement recycling systems for waste materials produced during manufacturing. We have also built a bird sanctuary.

With K.A.M. Salt sub-sector we continue to engage and work with the community through project Barazas as well as through the C.S.R. committee.

Learn About How We Helped Single Mothers In Meru.

Meru Mum’s

We continue to engage business coalitions such as Kenya Association of Manufacturers and partnerships with policy makers and provide them relevant information and expertise to pass meaningful, practical environmental regulation

Learn More About Our Partnership With The Girl Child Network.

The Girl Child Network are Awesome

“Putting the fine in refined. I am so fine I’m a powder. I go perfectly in industries that require mixing like the baking industry. I’m available in 50kg packages in Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi, South Sudan, the DRC, and Malawi.

“Iodized and chunky, my crunchy granules of goodness contain healthy trace minerals. I’m perfect for adding some extra crunch to whatever you are eating, which is why culinary proffesionals and chefs love me. Due to my large nature I also frequent salt water pools as I am a healthier and cheaper alternative to chlorine. I’m available in Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi, South Sudan, the DRC, and Malawi in packs of 50kg.”

“Introducing our Heavy Weight Champion of the world (of salt) weighing in at 25kg and 50kgs. Available in Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Rwanda, Burundi, South Sudan, the DRC, and Malawi. These bags hold our refined goodness that’s certain to sort your salt needs for a while. Its iodized for health and makes a great table salt for a lot of use.”

“Habari! My name is Habari. I enjoy hanging out with all kinds of food mainly cos I get along well with all of them. You can normally find me in Uganda, the DRC, and Rwanda. If you ever want to grab a tasty meal, look for me. I normally weigh about 200g…or 500g and am iodized… wink wink”

The original salt. Produced for export and available in Tanzania in packs of 200g, 500g, and 1kg,. I go well with all sorts of food. Iodized to ensure resistance to goiter. Pick me! 

During the camp a total of 762 people were screened and treated for various illnesses by the Ministry of Health. In addition, over 200 people were tested in the VCT facility at the hospital.

During the post analysis of the medical camp the following briefing was communicated by the doctor in charge of the medical camp;

• 13 persons were found to be diabetic out of which one was in critical condition. He was referred to Nyeri District Hospital and was assisted by the Nyeri County ambulance that was on stand by.
• 215 people used the VCT services
• 196 children were assessed by the EARC personnel and given assessment reports for placement in schools.
• 572 persons with disabilities attended the medical camp and were treated for various illnesses.