Business 17 September 2026 Daily Monitor (Uganda)
Shs394 Billion Cassava Plant Hampered by Energy Crisis
A state-of-the-art Shs394 billion cassava processing plant in Kamuli District is operating below capacity due to unreliable electricity supply. The facility is forced to spend Shs15 million daily on diesel generators. Source: https://www.monitor.co.ug/uganda/news/national/shs394b-cassava-plant-stuck-due-to-energy-crisis-5599300
Dei BioPharma Limited’s significant investment in a high-tech cassava processing plant in Kamuli District is facing a major hurdle: the lack of sufficient and consistent electricity.
The facility, valued at Shs394 billion, has been ready for full-scale production for over 18 months. However, it is forced to operate intermittently because the available power supply is inadequate for its sophisticated machinery.
To keep some operations running, the biotech and pharmaceutical research firm is incurring substantial daily costs, estimated at Shs15 million, to power diesel generators. This situation is preventing the plant from reaching its designed processing capacity of 500 tonnes of cassava per day.
The plant, situated on approximately 700 acres in Busambu, Namasagali Sub-county, is designed to transform cassava into valuable products such as pharmaceutical-grade starch, glucose, maltose, and fructose. Its underutilization not only impacts the company’s economic viability but also affects the potential benefits for local farmers who rely on consistent demand for their produce.
The energy deficit is a critical bottleneck, turning a potentially transformative agricultural processing hub into a partially idle asset, highlighting a persistent challenge for industrial development in the region.