Across the continent, young innovators are designing solutions for food insecurity, climate stress, and unemployment. Universities are producing research with real potential. Entrepreneurs are experimenting in agriculture, the bioeconomy, and enterprise development. Yet most of these efforts stall before they scale. They remain boxed in by borders, disconnected from peers, and unsupported by the networks that turn promising ideas into durable systems.
We celebrate high-profile tech hubs and headline-grabbing start-ups, but we pay far less attention to the quiet institutions that make innovation travel. That oversight matters. Because innovation does not grow in isolation. It grows in ecosystems.
One institution that understands this is CoELIB at Egerton University, Kenya. CoELIB is deliberately structured to connect people, ideas, and institutions across borders, and that makes it worth paying attention to.
At its core, CoELIB is more than a national research centre. Its stated mission is to empower “entrepreneurs, researchers and change-makers across Africa,” and it takes that mandate seriously. Through business incubation, technical consulting, research commercialisation, policy engagement, and media advocacy, the centre is designed to move knowledge outward, beyond campuses, beyond counties, and beyond Kenya.
One of the clearest examples of this approach is the African Animal Breeding Network (AABNet). Hosted by CoELIB, AABNet brings together animal breeders, geneticists, researchers, and livestock experts from across the continent. Its goal is straightforward: improve livestock productivity and sustainability using African expertise.
This matters because livestock systems underpin food security and rural livelihoods for millions of Africans. Yet for decades, breeding strategies have relied heavily on imported models that often fail under local conditions. AABNet takes a different approach. It pools regional expertise, supports joint research, and enables African scientists to co-design solutions suited to diverse ecological and production systems. It is collaboration in practice, not theory.
CoELIB’s work extends well beyond livestock genetics. Its Power for Food Partnership operates at community level, working with counties such as Nakuru, Kakamega, and Busia to scale agricultural research and resilience strategies that respond to local needs. While the work begins in Kenya, the lessons do not stop there. Climate stress, food insecurity, and fragile value chains are shared realities across the region. The models being tested locally are relevant far beyond national borders.
Another often-overlooked dimension of innovation is narrative. Technical solutions alone do not shift systems, people do. That is the insight behind Voices for Sustainable Food Systems and Quality of Life, a programme that uses communication, media, and advocacy to influence behaviour and policy. Through storytelling, CoELIB elevates community voices that are usually missing from regional conversations about agriculture and development.
The film Seeds of Change, produced in collaboration with TAGDev 2.0, captures this approach well. It centres youth voices, highlights inclusion, including people with disabilities, and challenges the idea that agriculture is backward or unappealing. It is a reminder that innovation is as much about perception as it is about technology.
Policy, too, plays a role. Innovation does not happen in a vacuum. The National Bioeconomy Educational and Policy Framework in Kenya (Bio‑KE), co‑implemented by CoELIB, seeks to link academia, industry, and policymakers to strengthen research capacity and bio‑entrepreneurship. While Bio‑KE is nationally anchored, bioeconomy transformation is inherently transnational. Resources, markets, and value chains cross borders, whether policy keeps up or not.
CoELIB’s work with the KCB Foundation and Mastercard Foundation on MSME capacity building reinforces this broader logic. By equipping young entrepreneurs with business skills, mentorship, and networks, these programmes prepare them not just for local survival but for regional competitiveness. The same is true for initiatives supporting novel agribusiness-led employment, which help youth access finance, incubators, and opportunities that extend beyond domestic markets.
The lesson here is simple. Without shared innovation ecosystems, Africa’s brightest ideas will continue to stall. Institutions like CoELIB provide the connective tissue, networks, platforms, and relationships that make regional innovation possible.Africa’s challenges are shared. Its solutions must be too. The future will not be built through isolated success stories, but through cooperation, trust, and institutions that understand that progress travels faster when it is shared.
