The Africa Centre of Excellence for Sustainable Cooling and Cold-Chain (ACES) drives the deployment of clean cooling technologies and, in parallel, through its various training courses, builds the technical expertise needed to operate and maintain a sustainable cold-chain. At ACES, programme participants are not only trained to become fully equipped technicians/engineers capable of handling sophisticated technical tasks in the industry, but also developed into forward thinkers able to tackle pressing climate change issues and social challenges. As an ACES trainee, you will be guided by a combination of world-class international and local trainers, however, equally importantly, you will be supported to develop innovative and inclusive solutions fit for a community of your choice. Solutions that are scalable to the national, regional, and international levels. Moreover, an exciting interactive enabling environment is created by ACES in which trainees have opportunities to lead some of the learning sessions themselves.
The ACES Learning Journey
ACES, along with the Clean Cooling Network (CCN) more broadly, is establishing a learning journey that enables participants to accumulate programme credits whilst taking courses that match their interests over non-continuous time slots. Accumulated credits result in a certificate or a diploma. Your work experience is also valued - we convert it into micro-learning credits, which are added to your tally, contributing to obtaining the certificate or diploma. Moreover, CCN apprenticeship programmes and online courses allow trainees to learn and get work experience simultaneously by counting both the formal learning effort and work experience towards your certificate/diploma.
As an ACES/CCN student, the learning resources available on the Kigali campus, which include state-of-the-art facilities such as the Refrigeration Training Centre and the Demo-Hall, offer you unmatched “hands-on” experience through practical sessions. In addition to this campus-based practical learning, we conduct study tours for trainees to gain “in-the-field” exposure and to identify the cooling needs in communities. Our trainees assist communities to address challenges in relation to post-harvest handling, cooling and cold-chain, health, quality control, energy efficiency, and the environment.
Training & The Community
Our training ranges from technical one-day courses to year-long training programmes. Foundation and technical short courses aim to bridge gaps among refrigeration technicians, farm operators, farmers, aggregators, and health personnel, to ensure proper management of cold-chains from farm to fork for foods, and, for health products, from manufacturer to arm. Additionally, our current “train-the-trainer” programme, which lasts for a year, is a flagship offer that aims to provide key members of a community with the training needed to transfer knowledge and help build in-country capacity, thereby improving existing systems through a bottom-up approach that promotes new businesses and increases the sustainability and resilience of supply chains.
Crucially, at CCN, we believe in not only building technical capacity amongst the community but also contributing to the creation of an inclusive community through our training programmes. In realising this aim, we offer Gender Equality and Social Inclusion (GESI) courses that sensitise stakeholders - including policymakers, implementing partners, and the broader community - to the value of GESI in delivering a sustainable and resilient cooling and cold-chain sector. This includes guiding participants on how to integrate GESI into their strategies, projects, organisations, and national and local policies. The courses are, however, not just a medium to transfer knowledge and new skills, but an opportunity to both reflect on the gaps in current strategy and lobby for an inclusive cooling and cold-chain sector.
ACES, Training & Beyond
ACES has trained more than 350 people from different sectors across more than 25 training courses at its campus in Kigali in the last four months alone. And CCN/ACES will keep expanding its scope, increasing the number of trainees while maintaining the quality of our programmes/courses as our capacity increases sharply in the coming months. This includes the launch of a series of online courses hosted on the new Clean Cooling Online Learning platform. Self-paced and mobile-friendly, these new offerings will be optimised for areas with limited connectivity and accessible for all.
Finally, for now, ACES is planning to launch accredited master’s and CPD courses across key areas, including Energy and Engineering, Business (Logistics, Data, Climate Science, People & Culture), Food Science and Postharvest Management (Food Safety, Processing), and Global Health, to build specialised, industry-relevant skills for sustainable development.
Get Involved
Are you seeking new challenges and looking to learn skills rare in the market? Do you want to undergo a unique, flexible, learner-centred CCN learning journey? Visit our academy to learn more about ACES training programmes and join the CCN community today for the latest in news, events and discussions around cooling and cold-chain.