A Solution to Save Food to Feed the World

In today’s world of growing populations and food needs, we are revisiting, with respect to agriculture, the old adage "Give a man a fish and he eats for a day; teach a man to fish and he eats for a lifetime." However, too often in the developing world, we are letting the newly-educated man down by not providing him with infrastructure needed to save, sell, or transport what he grows. India, Africa, Latin America and other developing regions continue to face crippling hunger and poverty rates. Despite the consistent production of agricultural products, the post-harvest loss rate for fruits and vegetables hovers around 40% and has remained there for years, undermining the ability of local farmers to feed their countrymen and develop exports. The total spoilage of post-harvest loss hovers around 1.3 billion tons. Some important facts and figures:

n In India only 2% of products are temperature controlled n Post-harvest losses cost China at least $6 billion per year and Pakistan $1 billion n In Panama post-harvest losses approach 60 % n In Sub-Saharan Africa, post-harvest losses of horticultural crops range from 30 percent to

an astonishing 80 percent. To address this world-wide problem of spoilage and to improve the potential for developing countries to feed their populations, Nenko Advisors International, LLC has developed a concept unique in concept and implementation: RASP®. What is RASP®? RASP® is an off-the-grid, alternative energy, agricultural cold storage facility aimed at preventing post-harvest loss of fruits and vegetables worldwide. With RASP®, we combine the latest in cold storage manufacturing technology and control with a specially designed PV solar power as the energy source. Using electronically integrated systems, combined with proprietary control units, RASP® produces a cold storage product potentially capable of dramatically reducing the loss of fruits and vegetables in the developing economies of the world. The RASP® cold room can be located at any point in the supply chain, from the farm, to the village, to the export center. The current service life of this power system is projected to be 25 years. The RASP® cold room is planned to be 24 ft x 10 ft x 8 ft. but scalable to meet the needs of each geogrphical area and can become part of a complete hub and spoke distribution and storage system. The entire system, which includes the solar power arrays, battery storage banks, control units and cold room, can be easily assembled in a matter of days by a small team of semi-skilled workers. The amount of crops that can be stored in each RASP® unit is estimated at a minimum of 10 metric tons, with scalability to larger capacities possible and anticipated.

Why RASP®? RASP® supplies the missing link in the cold chain with ease of deployment, cost effectiveness, ease of operation, low maintenance, scalability and the ability to be remotely controlled and monitored. It also has the potential to allow farmers globally to maximize their crop production by utilizing all of the land that they have available to plant. RASP® will allow farmers to harvest crops when they are at the right time to be harvested and therefore maximizing the potential for income. In many cases our research shows that crops are picked when the “middle man” is coming not when the farmer should. When fully deployed, RASP® should dramatically increase the amount of cold storage available worldwide and can play a key role in solving the puzzle of reducing world-wide crop spoilage. What Next for RASP®? The developers of RASP® are seeking the funding to erect its demonstration unit in the US and this number pales in comparison to the following statistics found on www.stopthehunger.com There over 896 million people in the world who are undernourished. Over $4.5 Million is spent on daily subsistence food aid, which represents over $1.97 Billion per year. The $1.97 Billion would pay for over 10,600 RASP® units, which in turn could feed many more people and by using local products rather than imported crops. The RASP® team once the demonstration is built will show the potential customers we have that our solution can truly help feed the world and truly make “fishermen” out of every farmer globally. The world needs to go beyond studies and investigations and programs on growing more but needs to invest in solutions like RASP® that focus on saving what is already grown, provides access to more income for farmers globally, and improving the infrastructure in those areas of the world that need it the most. Bruce H. Rubin Nenko Advisors International, LLC