February Newsletter

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Hello from JUA Technologies and welcome to our first newsletter

A word from the CEO

We hope you’ve had a wonderful start to 2023! We believe that, although you can try something new at any time, the start of the year is a great opportunity for making positive changes.

This year, one of our New Year’s resolutions is to keep in touch with you more. Through this newsletter, we’ll be sending regular updates about what we’ve been up to, sharing tips and tricks for sustainable living and talking about ways that we can help take care of our planet.

Way back in 2016, we founded a company with a mission focused on reducing post-harvest losses and food waste for small growers and two years later in 2018, we launched a product that we thought could help end food waste and support people living in countries impacted by food and nutrition insecurity. We called it the Dehytray™; a portable solar food dryer that uses sunlight to dehydrate food naturally to keep it longer without any additional energy for storage by refrigeration or preservatives.

We launched and sold our first Dehytray™ in December 2018 and since then, we’ve helped people all over the world to reduce their post-harvest/ food waste and create delicious, preserved ingredients. In fact, we’ve shipped over 10,000 Dehytrays to over 10 countries around the world, where they are being used by households, farmers, micro-agri enterprises, agri-coopertives and schools. We are slowly making an impact.

In 2021, we shipped 8,000 Dehytrays™ to the Government of Kenya. Kenya is a country that’s been impacted by wide-spread food insecurity, but a country with a government that has a mission to solve food insecurity challenges by encouraging home gardening. We now have a sister company based in Kenya, Dehytech East Africa Limited, which helps support farmers and families to access the Dehytrays and trains them to preserve the fruit and vegetables they grow in their kitchen gardens.

We are forever grateful to everyone who has supported us in our mission to reduce post-harvest losses and food waste, and create more food secure societies. We’re excited to use this newsletter to talk about the ways our community is helping to tackle the food and climate crisis and to share tasty recipes and tips for preserving and preparing food using free, natural solar power.

If you have a recipe you’d like to share, an inspiring climate activist you think we should know about or have a suggestion for what you would like us to include in our newsletter, please let us know. You can get in touch with us by emailing klein.ileleji@juatechnology.com

Best wishes to you in 2023 and God bless!

Klein Ileleji

Read our story

Our 2022 highlights

We were awarded Great Lakes Region and the State of Indiana exporter of the year in 2022 by the U.S Small Business Administration (SBA), a prestigious award that recognises the impact that our solar drying technology has had on families and farmers and the potential it has to help end food insecurity.

This award has helped us achieve one of our goals of expanding our work overseas, beginning in Kenya. Just like we offer to our US customers, we are now able to offer free shipping to customers in Kenya, as well as give discounts on our products for people in developing countries who would otherwise struggle to afford a Dehytray™. We will continue to work towards reducing the price customers pay for a Dehytray™, as we believe it is a tool every gardener should have in their home.

Establishing Dehytech East Africa Limited also helped us launch our educational outreach work in Kenya. Staff from JUA Technologies started going into schools to teach children and teachers about using solar dehydration to preserve fruits and vegetables, so
that they keep food longer, and can be used in preparing tasty and healthy meals.

What does the future hold?

We know that the impacts of climate change and food insecurity are unfortunately not going anywhere. The UN World Food Programme estimates that 30 million children go to bed hungry every night and rising temperatures across the planet are impacting how much food farmers can grow.

As a mission-led organisation, we want to support people impacted by climate change as much as we can. This year, we are aiming to reduce the cost of our Dehytrays™ in Kenya so we can help more people access affordable and healthy food.

One of the ways we want to do this is by partnering with more likeminded people like you who can help us inform your neighbour about the benefits of solar dehydration and the Dehytray™ as a tool for use in solar drying of foods. If you know about businesses, faith-based organisations or NGOs that would be interested in collaborating with us, please drop us an email, we’d love to hear from you!

Recipe of the Month: Sun-dried Tomato Paste

Sun-dried tomatoes are versatile little veggies. Whether you stick them in a salad, use them to add a little sweetness to a sandwich or chop them through pasta, they’re a delicious way to use dehydrated tomatoes.

One of our favourite ways to use sundried tomatoes is to create a paste to spread on toast or stir through a sauce. Here’s our recipe for a tasty sundried tomato paste:

Ingredients:

Around 400g of sundried tomatoes
4 cloves of garlic
1⁄2 cup olive oil
A handful of chopped parsley
Salt and black pepper

Instructions:

Chop up the tomatoes into small bite-size pieces and crush the garlic
Combine everything in a food processor and blitz until smooth
Adjust the oil and seasoning until you’re happy with the taste and texture

From JUA Technologies International, Inc.

Last year, we welcomed Prasanna Janakiraman to JUA Technologies. Prasanna is passionate about food security and nutrition and is incredibly knowledgeable about food production, having earned a BS. in Agricultural and Biological Engineering and an MBA from Purdue University.

A man of many talents, Prasanna is the Chief of Staff to the CEO and leads on JUA’s sales and marketing. Welcome to the team Prasanna!

From Dehytech East Africa Limited

Naomi Kamene Mutisya began working with Dehytech East Africa Limited in Nairobi in March 2022. She is passionate about helping farmers and households prevent post-harvest losses and food waste.

She currently leads Dehytech sales and marketing efforts in Kenya, and also serves as the technology expert for the Dehytray™. Naomi graduated with a B.S. in Food Science and Technology from Meru University of Science and Technology.