This year marks a major milestone for the company as we celebrate our 70th anniversary. We had a lot of activities lined up to celebrate this major milestone. One of the activities was a Customer Open day that took place on Friday, 13th May.

We had invited our major suppliers, both from overseas and local, as well as our major customers from the various departments and branches in Kenya to showcase the various products and technologies that we have on offer. Of particular interest was the iDayliff monitoring system that drew a lot of interest from the guests.

It was also a chance to officially open our new building named the Dayliff building. The building has a floor space of 1500m2 and will host our HR and training center, logistics and supply teams and the expanded canteen that has a capacity of 180 people. The building was officially opened by the guest of honor, Dr. Abbas Gullet, the secretary general of the Kenya Red Cross Society. The building features the runs the latest in green technology as well as other state of the art features. It has solar PV electricity and solar heated water. It also has a wireless telephony system that will see employees use soft phone instead of desk phones saving the company a huge expense.

The open day was attended by over 200 guests. Our overseas suppliers represented included Grundfos (represented by Lee Carlin and David Githendu), Pedrollo, (represented by Dr. Moustapha Tounkara and Andrea Abagnato), Dab Pumps (represented by Carlo Fuccela), Midas (represented by Elena Jakobson), Yanan (represented by Bella Zheng and Owen Lu), Lorentz (represented by Kai Reinecke) and Davey pumps (represented by Murray Jones & Ahmad Mushtak). In attendance also was the high commissioner of Zambia to Kenya HE Brenda Muntemba who commended the work done by Davis & Shirtliff in both Kenya and Zambia.

The occasion also was used to hand over the various projects that the company undertook under its CSR initiative to the various beneficiaries. The beneficiaries were Life Spring Christian academy from Kibera, Karen technical training school for the deaf and to a community in Namanga supported by Wellaware nonprofit making organization. The projects would go a long way in supporting the community and improving their lives in-line with our slogan. Check below for the photo gallery. You can also check out our social media account to see how the event unfolded on Twitter and Facebook

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18th May 2016

This year is particularly special for us. This year we shall celebrate our 70th anniversary. It is no mean feat by all standards. We have a couple of activities lined up to commemorate this occasion. On Saturday, May 14^th, we shall have a walk from Westlands

, Nyota Petrol station right next to Westlands bus stop to our premises along Dundori road.

The company started its operations at the present day Nyota Petrol station in 1946 run by Eddie Davis and Dick Shirtliff, the founding fathers of Davis & Shirtliff.

We shall use the following roads during the day :- Mpaka Road, Waiyaki Way, Uhuru highway, Mombasa road, Lusaka road, Dunga road and Dundori road.

Have a look at the walk route below. You can also click {modal https://www.google.com/maps/d/embed?mid=1cDvoujv4RankcwjFO9EDjBUcCNo|width=1000|height=600|title=70th anniversary walk route}here{/modal} to view an interactive map

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10th May 2016

Over the weekend some of our staff led by Retail sales Manager Moses Kitheka and Wholesale manager Michael Njeru visit St. Mary’s Kinyambu girls high school, a girls only boarding school in Kibwezi to commission a borehole that we had equipped as part of our CSR, as well as food stuff.

The school in located about 9km from Kibwezi town in Makueni County. It has a population of about 290 students and about 10 teachers under TSC.

The students have been using a hand pump to pump water for their everyday needs as well as juggling studies. The borehole pump will go a long way in helping them study better and improve their grades. The head master also expressed his sincere gratitude saying that they might increase the number of students admitted in the coming year due to the improved water supply. We believe that this will greatly improve their lives and the fortunes of the school.

The borehole equipment was donated as part of our CSR activities to celebrate our 70th anniversary.

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09th May 2016

One of the most important national resources for any nation is her flora and fauna. Some are unique to the nation that they appear and cannot be found anywhere else. When the Dodo was hunted to extinction in Mauritius, it didn’t appear then that this was the last stand of the bird. Many thought that it was also resident in other islands in the Indian Ocean but it turned out that it was only found in Mauritius.

The African elephant is classified under threatened species due to its dwindling numbers over the last century. From a high of 10 million strong, they number now close to half a million and that number is falling daily. Elephants were once found in Western Africa but due to poaching and habitat destruction, few roam these lands, if any. In Eastern and Southern Africa, there is still a considerable number and huge conservation efforts have been put in place that has seen a resurgence in the numbers.

However, in the last couple of years, the supply of Ivory has reduced considerably but the demand of the same in the Far East nations has not reduced, thus the price of ivory has shot up astronomically. The price of a kilo of ivory now goes for as much as USD. 2000. This has forced many back to the national parks and game reserves to hunt elephants for their Ivory.

"The Price of a kilo of ivory goes for as much as USD. 2000"

On the 30^th of April several heads of state lead by President Uhuru Kenyatta, conservationists and several celebrities such as award winning actors Leonardo Decaprio and Nicole Kidman will gather to watch as 105 tons of elephants tusks are set ablaze at the Nairobi National park. This will be the largest pile of ivory every burnt in history. Elephant tusks are formed from dentine, the same substance that forms our teeth. Though it does not burn, if subjected to high temperatures, it will disintegrate. For this, it has to be subjected to high temperatures close to 1000⁰C for possibly 5 – 7 days. The fuel to be used is jet fuel since it burns very efficiently.

The fuel has to be delivered at a high pressure for proper combustion. This is where Davis & Shirtliff comes in. We’re supplying the pump to be used in the delivery of the fuel at a high pressure and thus contributing in a small way to Elephants conservation for future generations. The pump will be a Davey 5 series high pressure engine pump. The pump is able to supply fluids such as petrol and water at a high pressure for a long period of time without affecting its performance.

We hope this will send a message to the nations of the World that we only have tusks if they’re on an elephant. Elephants are worth more alive. Our engineers Isaac Chege and Maxwel Melachy were on site to ensure that everything went according to plan. See below the #LightAFire moments

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28th Apr 2016

One of the millennium development goals (MDGs) for Kenya is to halve the proportion of people living on less than 1 dollar a day. Kenya has a population of about 44.35 million with a good proportion living in rural areas where the main economic activity is subsistence farming. This also forms a huge proportion of the population living on less than a dollar a day.

The size of arable land in Kenya is about 10.2% of the total land. Most of this land is taken up by cash crops such as tea and coffee living little land for food crops. Though the county is food sufficient, recent cases of drought have seen the government provide relief food for some areas of the country. With subdivision of land for sale and putting up of permanent structures on the same on the increase, more land that could have been used for agriculture is on the decline.

To compound the situation, there is also an increase in the youth population with about 1 million young adults joining the work force each year. However, job creation and opportunities still remain a huge challenge in the country. The government has been on a campaign to try and urge more young people to venture into self-employment by advancing of credit facilities for them to set up businesses. Also, investment in different areas of the economy has seen also been on the increase, a sign of better fortunes in the future.

Kenya has a capacity to have about 45% of its land under agriculture using irrigation. This remains one of the areas, if properly tapped, could reap huge benefits of the country. Agriculture, still forms the backbone of the country employing about 70% of the population directly or indirectly. If more youth can get into agriculture, this would increase the food sufficiency of the country as well as increase the amount of land under agriculture. It would also offer much needed employment opportunities to the youth. This remains one of the areas that has been hugely untapped. The government has started a project to have 1 million acres of land under irrigation in Tana River County. Similar other projects by different counties have been initiated in Mandera, Wajir, Lodwar etc.

In 2013, 2 aquifers were discovered in Turkana that could supply the country with water for up to 70 years. The water can be used for irrigation. For us to increase the land under agriculture, we must employ technology such as irrigation. At Davis & Shirtliff, our solutions are aimed at improving people’s lives. With some of the products that we offers such as engine pumps, one can be able to do irrigation on their land, all year round instead of relying on rain fed agriculture that has become quite erratic. Irrigation allows one to farm all year round and increase the acreage under agriculture. This concept has been taken up and has seen farms mushroom in areas usually considered too dry for farming such as Kajiado, Makueni, Kitui, Mandera and Turkana.

We offer a wide range of solutions that can help you turn your farm into a business that has the potential to employ hundreds. Click here to see some of our solutions. You can also get in touch with us on this here or drop us a line at +254719079000

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27th Apr 2016

Access to safe water in Kenya remains one of the most important items in the national government agenda and also in the county governments. This was identified long before the dawn of the new millennium with the item set as one of the millennium development goals for Kenya.

The access to the right quality and quantity of water in most Kenyan households still poses a huge challenge. With almost 17 million people lacking access to safe water, this is a huge part of the population. This in turn has had a huge impact on health and infant mortality. Over 3000 children die each year from diarrheal diseases associated by unsafe water. Others end up enduring long durations out of school due to illness as well as trekking long distances to fetch water.

This impact has been felt almost in all sectors of the economy. Water remains one of the most fundamental factors for all sectors of the economy from agriculture, tourism, the hospitality industry, manufacturing, health etc. There has been a lot of effort especially by the national government and the counties to increase access to safe water through increasing the number of households served by piped water, increasing the number of water companies and increasing the capacity of the existing ones to be able to serve a bigger population.

With the various sources of water available in Kenya, the only thing that maybe required to guarantee the safety of the water is water treatment. Water treatment is the process that makes water acceptable for a specific end use. The end use in this situation being drinking. There are various solutions that can be installed and used for small and medium sized households to handle water treatment. At Davis & Shirtliff, we have specialized in the provision of these solutions. These solutions are low cost and highly effective.

A solution such as the domestic gravity feed 8 stage purifier can provide quality drinking water from the county sources. It can provide up to 30litres per day and has a storage capacity of 9litres.

Other solutions such as an under sink reverse osmosis (RO) can comfortably fit under a sink and has 6 stages of purification including Ultra Violet(UV) sterilization as well as giving an output of more than 200 litres per day.

During the rainy season, rain water can also be collected and pumped into the domestic system and similarly treated to make it safe for drinking and other purposes.

You can contact us so that we can advise you on the best solutions. See also more solutions that we offer under water treatment here.

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19th Apr 2016