An overview of refrigeration and its impact on the development in the Democratic Republic of Congo

Abstract

The development of refrigeration is a priority in all countries, given the multidimensional roles that it plays in the sustainable development of society. In developing countries, efforts are being made to catch up with the delayed experienced in the use of refrigeration. To achieve this goal, several countries are allowed to trace the history of refrigeration in their countries in order to understand the main causes of non-expansion, and then set up a new strategy of sustainable development for this technology. The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) is a developing country that has experienced a very interesting history of refrigeration, but is still less known by the Congolese themselves as well as by scientists. This paper has traced out the outline in the history of refrigeration in the DRC. Surveys were conducted in the industrial, health, residential, commercial, and tourism sectors during the colonial and post-colonial period. Results showed that the use of refrigeration in the DRC has been remarkably observed in the industrial sector, especially in breweries, with a cooling capacity ranging from 50.1 thousand to 2.88 million kWh, about 5 659 % between 1929 and 1957; from 3 million to 26.5 million kWh, about 783.3 % between 1958 and 1980, and then dropped to 6.5 million kWh in 2004 before resuming its growth up to 11 million kWh in 2009. The variations in the use of refrigeration during the above periods significantly influenced the economy, in the sense that the economic and social indicators of the country grew from 0.415 to 0.430 between 1975 and 1985, and then declined to 0.375 in 2000, due to political instability, before rising up to 0.410 in 2005.