Impact First; The Story of Wonder Welders
(*Editors Note: This piece was originally published in Stanford Social Innovation Review Blog on 6/17/11)
Ciprian Bwile makes toys, animals, and bookends from scrap wood
For close to a year, I’ve been taking a first-hand look at East African social enterprises, as part of The (BoP) Project. I’ve encountered a wondrously diverse ecosystem of enterprises and entrepreneurs, including smaller pilot endeavors like Egg-Energy and old-timers like KickStart. I’ve seen some remarkably innovative approaches and models built to profitably serve the needs of those at the base of the economic pyramid in the region—from mobile phone payments for clean water to pay-per-use toilets and showers in slums around Nairobi. Yet despite the variances in sectors, target markets, funding sources, and so on, they all seem to have two quite distinct commonalities: a comprehensive, impact-driven business model, and a plan to “scale big.”
Paul Hicks, founder of Wonder Welders, has neither—yet he has trained and now employs 35 local, physically disabled staff at a welding and crafts workshop in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
A photographer by profession, Hicks never really intended to take a “market-based approach to creating opportunities for the disabled,” or to develop a social business model that has the potential—with the right kind of help—to scale. But he has.
Back in 2003, Hicks would pass by several disabled individuals at an intersection on his way to work each day. Many were victims of polio, which if left untreated and in severe cases can lead to a paralytic disease most commonly affecting the leg muscles, causing them to become weak, poorly controlled, and finally paralyzed. Others he encountered were born with various birth defects, resulting in stunted development or complete loss of control of their legs. Eventually, they started asking for some kind of work. “I was a photographer; I couldn’t give them a job,” he said.
A Wonder Welder’s employee puts the finishing touches on a metal pig.
But after toying around in a friend’s welding shop one day, Hicks realized that there was nothing preventing the disabled people he met from welding or doing other types of crafts work. In fact, he saw their often-tremendous upper body strength as an advantage. So, in 2004, with seed funding from Goat Race charity, he launched Wonder Welders with just a handful of disabled workers, to make “Hip, Recycled Art” out of scrap metal, glass, paper, cans, pineapple tops, and other donated items.
Despite being a social enterprise that has demonstrated near-complete self-sufficiency (they accept but don’t actively seek out, donations), Wonder Welders does not specifically brand or market itself a “social business.” Apart from its website, there is no indication that products are made by disabled workers, and the organization has never even bothered with an impact assessment. Hicks, originally from the UK, has never attended a social enterprise conference and never called himself a social entrepreneur. In Tanzania and other parts of Africa, people with disabilities often are not considered hireable—Hicks simply hired them.
Metal crocodiles for sale at Wonder Welder’s Workshop in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania.
“If everyone knew the products were made by disabled workers, many would buy them just to support the organization,” Hicks says. “Instead, we’d rather people buy them because they’re high-quality, recycled pieces of art. And they do!”
But Wonder Welders has hit capacity. While Hicks has no doubt the model can scale across Tanzania, and even to other parts of Africa, its approach will certainly have to change. The business will need investment, and to attract investment in this space, so the pattern goes, they will need to produce two things: detailed impact reports and a plan to “scale big.”
Joseph Mpepo, originally from a southern region of Tanzania close to the Zambian border, has extremely limited use of his legs, and like most employees, works on the ground.
Kinunu Coffee Washing Station, overlooking the banks of Lake Kivu in Western Rwanda.
It’s a country of breathtaking beauty. Winding along some of the best paved roads in East Africa, my eyes roll over a vast expanse of endless green hills, dotted with lush banana trees jutting out from tiny farms, where perhaps a farmer and his family own a densely packed acre or two of land, producing just barely enough to feed themselves.
Rwanda, and the capital city of Kigali, is orderly; a place which can be described as quiet, pleasant, and cautious. It’s a refreshing break from travels elsewhere in the region, where the chaos of traffic, noise, beggars, hawkers, and potholes grind your stamina into a pulp, to the point where at the end of each day you find yourself dripping into whatever cheap accommodations you’re able to find. Perhaps it’s different if you’re on official business, getting paid a decent salary, bolstered by a UN project or traveling on a luxurious vacation. You may not find these differences so stark traveling by land cruiser and sleeping with air conditioning. Yet for the lone, semi-broke photo-journalist who buses across countries to find himself deep in the thicket of the streets, markets, potholes and pockets of daily life, Rwanda is a nice place to stop and think.
Over the past week, I’ve stumbled into something a little off course from the normal (BoP) Project story, but quite significant nonetheless. I’ve fallen head first into the speciality coffee industry of Rwanda, spending time with farmers, international buyers, agronomists and exporters. I’ve had the chance to tour coffee washing stations, cooperatives, dry mills, roasters, and basically learn first hand about the emergence of Rwandan coffee on the international market, and its impact on the country. As Rwanda’s second largest export, while it can’t be hailed as the driving force for Rwanda’s “impressive” economic growth in the past few years, an increase in coffee prices worldwide has certainly had a positive impact on some coffee farmers in Rwanda, and the businesses working with them. I’m looking at putting together a long photo-story on the rise in demand for high quality, specialty Rwandan coffee, and how it can/is possibly bringing about more sustainable economic change for farmers and building a new market here.
In the simplest form possible; Higher quality coffee commands higher prices from speciality international roasters who care where, how, and from who coffee cherries are picked. Fair Trade, on the other hand, has nothing to do with quality or how it’s picked, and thus holds no real incentives for farmers and cooperatives to produce higher quality coffee. That’s besides the fact that Fair Trade is expensive and most of the money doesn’t even go to the farmers anyways…. but we’ll leave that for later. With higher quality coffee in Rwanda, however, a coffee farmer who is member of a cooperative is financially incentivized to produce better quality. If a local coffee cooperative operates ethically/transparently/properly, farmers can get paid significantly more for their coffee cherries if they are of good quality, thus propelling a more sustainable system and industry, benefiting, I would say, all. It’s a bit complicated to explain in a few sentences, but I’m looking forward to investigating and sharing the piece in a few months.
So, as I find myself tracing the success of one industry in Rwanda since 1994 -coffee,- I’m also finding myself mulling over the success of the country as a whole, in the decade and a half since the unspeakable genocide. On the lighter side, Kigali is beautiful, clean, orderly, quiet, and from the economic indicators it appears Rwanda is booming. Things are working, it seems. On the darker side, so I’ve been told, it’s all “smoke and mirrors,” a giant act, a pig in lipstick as Obama might say.
As I sat drinking a chilled Mutzig Beer at the “Transparence Bar” in the lively district of Nyamirambo, I wondered how transparent Rwanda really is. The pleasantness a traveler experiences, the quietness, the politeness, the order, has a creeping sense of an underlying air of tensity. There’s a thickness to the order of things, reinforced by a military patrol standing guard on every street corner, lurking in the shadows like a not so forgotten past. Is there stable progress? I haven’t been here long enough to say. Is there heavy repression? I can’t claim for sure, but apparently I need to temper my words, or I may be identified as a PNG (persona non-grata) and chucked out.
As I finished my beer, surrounded by a group of well dressed Kigali businessmen, a small boy walked up to me and said, quite matter-of-factly “you give me money.” Then he turned, with some friends, jumped on the rear bumper of a passing truck and hitched a ride off into the night.
On the surface, I love this place, its people, its traditions, its mannerisms. But it’s clear there is a lot to discover. I don’t know yet if I’m willing to go that deep, but I’ll take it one step at a time. We’ll see if the coffee infused buzz can keep me coming back here over the next three or four months…..
(*Note… I expect this post to strike readers as challenging, provocative, and- worst case- offensive. That’s perfectly fine by me. I’m doing nothing more than reporting my honest observations and insights from almost a year in East Africa, of which I hope people can prove me wrong about. I urge you to join the conversation and share your thoughts/experiences!)
On multiple occasions during interviews, I have felt a tinge of guilt associated with my work. I have felt awkward and- sometimes- used, which given the situations I am typically in as a photojournalist appears absurdly backwards.
As the person on the other side of the microphone or camera, “used” or “exploited” is what you may expect your subjects to feel if you don’t set a proper context and tone for the interview. Remember, you’re the one capturing and sharing their personal stories to people thousands of miles, figuratively and physically, from a dry, mud and grass hut in central Kenya.
Yet there’s something else that’s been making me feel uncomfortable. It’s an odd suspicion that I’m fueling something ultimately deceptive, playing into a different type of “poverty cycle,” in which true economic status and living conditions share only part of the blame.
Talking with locals who have benefited from various social enterprises or nonprofits, the stories are often quite similar. “I was poor, I had very little, life was extremely difficult.” Then, so it usually goes, “Now, after XYZ, I’m doing much better, and it’s because of XYZ.” True or not, frankly speaking, the same story gets repetitive, and I have begun looking for deeper meaning.
As a young journalist, this is obviously something to grapple with- how to reveal the honest and emotional truth from a story so often told, or from someone who the organization has connected me to. How do you decode the difference between the reality, and a more dramatized, media-geared portrayal thereof?
I’d say the majority of the time, the individuals I am conversing with seem genuine and sincere- a social enterprise or nonprofit truly did bring some form of life altering transformation. Maybe not to the extent that they portray it, but still, close enough. Yet in some instances, I feel something just isn’t right. There is a detachment from the words being spoken, a mentioning of things which- obviously- are meant to cue certain reactions for a foreigner with a pen and a camera.
In short, though I can’t necessarily prove it on any accounts, I feel as if sometimes I’m simply being duped. That those who I’m speaking with are acting some portrayal of poverty which, while reflecting their life, encapsulates a broader sort of characterization. They are telling me exactly what I want- or what they think I want- to hear. They are telling me a story that they know gains support for organizations working with the poor. The words they use may have been given to them by the organization they have dealt with, or perhaps by the media which portrays them.
My skepticism may very well get the better of me sometimes. Hearing so many stories of success, and such few -if any- of failure, remains troubling to someone who knows that behind every positive impact story, there must be several zero impact stories that remain untold, and perhaps even a handful of negative impact stories.
Allow me to demonstrate further with an example;
The Case of Nonprofit X…
Nonprofit X must do two things to get donor funding. First, it must convey a need. If there isn’t a need, Nonprofit X wouldn’t exist. “Family Z makes less than $2 per day, and cannot send their children to school. They go to bed hungry each night.” The message conveyed is that this Family Z needs support. Your support, in fact.
To convey this message and need, the nonprofit must record, usually most effectively in video format, a personal testimony whereby the individual or family speaks about their condition and their needs. In most cases, they aren’t sure exactly what to say, or to whom they are saying it. It’s also likely, depending on the location, that they may have never looked into video camera before.
Second, Nonprofit X must convey their impact. How did Nonprofit X improve the conditions of the Family Z, thereby warranting the necessity of Nonprofit X and its donors? Once again, this is typically done through interviews and/or video footage. In the case of a video, Family Z is prompted on what to say, since again they aren’t aware of who they are speaking to. In the case of an interview, the interviewer will ask questions clearly designed to discover the positive impact of Nonprofit X. “How has your life improved since…” is the key one.
This hardly seems wrong on an individual scale. Nonprofit X does great work (one hopes), and of course they need personal testimonies of needs and impacts to gain funding for their work.
But look beyond the individual case. Step back and see the broader picture. With billions upon billions of dollars poured into aid work over the past 40 years, nonprofits small and large emerging and evaporating each year, in all parts of the developing world, the impact of these individual testimonies can spread.
Through their media endeavors, nonprofits and even some social enterprises are developing a narrative of poverty FOR the poor- not about the poor. Speak about your problems, highlight the negative things about your life (but not the positive ones) to the media (or white man/woman with a camera), and someone will hopefully come and fix them. Then, speak about how difficult your life was before, and how good or improved it is now.
Note- I’m aware this is an EXTREMELY over simplistic analysis. However, I’m just using this as an illustration. If you have ever done documentation work with nonprofits, you might (reluctantly) understand where I’m coming from on all this.
Really, at the heart of this conflict, the focus on dependency is what seems to be most troubling to me. Because I am white (thereby, in the eyes of some locals, part of a foreign tribe of people who come, speak to locals about their problems, then bring money, food, wells, and schools for free), in some instances when people see me (granted usually not in interviews), they immediately launch into a narrative that reminds me of an interview for Nonprofit X. And why wouldn’t they? In the instance where I can speak the local language, or they are able to communicate in English, I ask them this question. Would you give this same monologue to a native of your country? If not, than why not? The conversation usually never stops at that…
Are Social Enterprises Any Different?
Now, let’s turn to social enterprises. What’s the difference? Truthfully, at this stage, not much. Most “social enterprises” at least in East Africa, are still not profitable yet, and continue to rely on donor funding or at the least, very “generous” investors who enjoy seeing the organization highlighted at social enterprise conferences or in the mainstream media.
So then, another begging question; What role does media play in the social enterprise field? Hypothetically speaking, social enterprises shouldn’t have a tangible need for media and news organizations to highlight and document their impact, with regards to the qualitative data and information such as personal stories, which nonprofits use most effectively to broadcast their impact. Quantitative data, the hard numbers and facts which demonstrate that they are improving conditions of the poor while their accounts stay out of the red, should be all the evidence needed.
Put simply, if a social enterprise is successful, then it will be profitable, or at least financially sustainable. They won’t need to prove or sell anything to a donor community.
Be that as it may, they still do it. Most self-titled social enterprises, at least in East Africa, are still registered as nonprofits, here and in their countries of origin, and still rely heavily on donor funding until they “prove a sustainable model.” Therefore, in terms of “selling impact” and marketing to donors, they fall into the same category of the many nonprofit organizations in which they are trying to distinguish themselves from.
Do businesses use personal stories testimonials to sell their products? Of course. But they are not using these testimonials to prove that their business model works or convince investors. They are doing it to prove their product works to customers, and sell more products to customers. So then a social enterprise should be selling its impact to its potential customers, not donors, and thus should have no real need to showcase individual stories tilted at the western community.
By the way, If anyone noticed, it probably sounds like I’m trying to put myself out of a job. But not really. I still feel these models should be covered by the media, as examples of alternative approaches to poverty, sustainable pro-poor businesses and the like, but what I’m hinting at is that this should be in no way the aim or ambition of a social enterprise.
For many, though, it is. And in a major way. The more conferences, the more media, the more attention, the more funding- is how it seems to go. Is this wrong? At a time when truly viable alternatives are being brought to the development discussion tables around the world in the form of social enterprises, don’t these new approaches need all the attention they can get? Don’t we want to show the world what else is out there? That’s what I intended to do in starting The (BoP) Project. Yet, what I’ve found has been rather thought-provoking.
One of the most honest, direct, and to-the-point pieces playfully challenging social enterprises I’ve come across recently as been Michael Fairbank’s “Self-Licking Ice Cream Cone” (http://www.daedalusexperiment.com/social-entrepreneur-self-licking-ice-cream-cone.php) analogy. In political terms, a self-licking ice cream cone is a “self-perpetuating system that has no purpose other than to sustain itself.” When applied to the social entrepreneur movement, it reveals a hidden truth which few would like to dwell on. Many social enterprises are not yet social enterprises, though they market themselves specifically on that point.
“A sustainable solution to XYZ.”. “Helping lift XYZ out of poverty.” “A market based approach to XYZ”.
The Hard Truth
Let’s face it; A good share of social enterprises at this stage are nonprofits with a more efficient aid model, a more modern and innovative approach, but they continue to necessitate donor funding. They haven’t found that model for sustainability yet. Or, worse, they find themselves in perpetual pilot mode, a sort of “social enterprise purgatory” as I like to call it.
Without going too in-depth at this stage in my journey, my point is this. There is an army of young western backed social enterprises marching into the field, and a growing number of organizations claiming they are social enterprises. At the same time, there are an endless string of awards, recognitions, programs and fellowships propelling them along, seemingly- and I’m using the word cautiously here- ignorant of their real, on the ground impact. They simply feed off the fantastic marketing of social enterprises, in the similar way that many nonprofit grants are mostly based on a very sexy and well written report.
What I ask is simple- before branding yourself, before selling yourself to the world, before you claim to have the “best” solution to poverty, make an impact. Demonstrate your success. Show profitability, or at least sustainability, or you will be only marginally different from those you’re trying to stand apart from.
I truly love the ideas, innovations, and approaches being born out of the social enterprise movement, and sincerely hope they succeed and scale. But let’s pause a minute, and take our time proving them before marketing them to the world.
Note: This article originally was written for and appeared under the title “The BoP In Pictures: One Entrepreneur’s Story” on NextBillion.net.
If you happen to come across Angelina Mwenzi while navigating your way through the tightly packed, and often slippery, footpaths of Silanga Village in the Kibera slums of Nairobi, you will undoubtedly conjure up one word: potential.
Angelina embodies the spirit, attitude and ambitions of a class of BoP entrepreneurs that social enterprises are scrambling to unlock. A woman who has been dealt the bottom of the deck, she capitalizes on every opportunity to improve, not only her own situation, but also the situation of her community.
Silanga, home to roughly 20,000 people, is not necessarily one of the roughest places in Kibera – it lies in the southeast corner of the dense urban slum, tucked on the edge of the Nairobi Reservoir. To one side, a tiny playground, community gardens, and a vast green marshland, which allows a slight breeze to slip between the thicket of poorly constructed sheet metal and mud brick dwellings. To the other, a vast expanse of poverty, untapped economic potential, and haphazard development attempts. Yet calling Silanga one of the “better” places of Kibera is somewhat akin to saying calling a prison ”good.” It’s still a prison. And Kibera, Africa’s second largest slum with a population estimated between 150,000 to 1 million, lacking even the most crude signs of acceptable infrastructure such as running water, power, and basic sanitation, offers its inhabitants limited means of escape.
Despite raising five children, four grandchildren, and now accommodating up to six people in one small bedroom, Angela fills as many hats as her head can hold to make ends meet and improve her community. Among her several positions in community committees and local NGO projects, she actively serves as a Community Health Promoter, is a member of the Riverside Silanga Garbage Collection group, tends to a small garden on the fringe of the village, sells bags of charcoal on the street to make a small income. And, since the end of last year, she earns 50-60 Kenyans shillings per day performing a task few would care to discuss let alone do: collecting poo.
That’s right. Feces. Little, specially treated, white and green bags of human excreta, to be exact. Angelina is one of a few locals empowered by PeepoopleAB, a Swedish social enterprise that launched a pilot project in Silanga in October.
She’s built her own small business out of The Peepoo, a personal, single use toilet that turns human waste into fertilizer. The device sanitizes human excreta shortly after defecation, preventing the feces from contaminating the surrounding environment. After just a few weeks, the bags convert the waste into a nutrient rich fertilizer.
The Peepoo bags, which sell at a subsidized (by Peepoople) cost of 3 Kenyan Shillings each, are used at home, then returned to one of two “drop off” points where customers get a 1 Ksh refund for returning the bags.
(A brochure explaing how to use Peepoo and santize hands afterward).
It’s in this simple, 1 Ksh refund, that Angelina saw an opportunity to develop a little venture for herself. Some residents either feel uncomfortable, or don’t have the time, to drop off the bags, which are designed to both eliminate odors and ensure the safety of the handler. Angelina collects bags from her neighbors, and returns them in bulk, pocketing the 1 Ksh refund.
On a good day, Angelina told me, she’ll collect and return 60-70 bags during her morning rounds (people leave them outside their houses for collection), making close to $0.85 for an hour’s work.
While some may protest the idea of using nothing more than a chemically treated doggy bag as a “sanitation solution,” first, consider the alternatives. A “flying toilet,” which is common in places such as Kibera, is nothing more than a small grocery bag used as a toilet and thrown out of a residence onto the street. Other options? Communal pit latrines, which are filthy, lack privacy, overflow during rains, and typically harbor more diseases than anyone would be comfortable measuring.
Then, speak to Peepoople co-founder Camilla Wirseen, who will list the World Health Organization’s guiding principles for “sanitation,” and point out that, in fact, The Peepoo is one of the few solutions that actually meets all of the requirements, even though it may seem counterintuitive. With no running water and little space to build proper toilets, The Peepoo is certainly an innovative personal option.
(Agelina, in front of her small garden)
Finally, ask Angelina. She’s capitalizing on other’s unwillingness or inability to return the bags, and in doing so easing the barriers to adoption of this pilot program in her community. If Peepoople continues to grow, and adoption of Peepoo bags in Silanga increases, Angelina can continue her small scheme and earn a bit more money. If the organization stalls, or fails for some reason, she’ll be right back where she started, perhaps with a few more Shillings saved under the mattress. No matter what, Angelina is the kind of woman who will keep looking out for that next opportunity.
Now, a considerably important question for the BoP development community remains. Is she simply entrepreneurial to survive, or the kind of entrepreneur who’s ready to build a thriving business?
Redemta Ndanu, of Wendano, Yatta District, Kenya, is happy to pay 3 Ksh for a jerrycan of clean water from a Grundfos LIFELINK System.
One of the paramount divides between social enterprises and traditional nonprofits, it seems can be narrowed down to simple economics. Last week, I had just finished a conversation with Guustaaf, who currently runs a social enterprise called Mango Tree Enterprises in Kampala, Uganda, which creates and markets games, puzzles, story charts, and other educational and communicational tools in east Africa, and was interested in putting some more thought into a comment he made.
“Nonprofits usually focus on a NEED. A [social] business must focus on DEMAND… and more nonprofits should probably as well. For us, there’s a clear demand for our services.”
So for those of us who have trouble remembering our basic Econ 101 course, what is a need, and what is a demand? And how does this affect the social enterprise/NGO discussion?
Demand, simply speaking, is what people/companies/organizations are willing and able to pay for. It not only means that they need something, but that they have the means to and are willing to pay for what they want.
A potential customer, poor or not, may want something, or need something, but unless they “demand” it, they will not purchase it. “The law of demand states that, if all other factors remain equal, the higher the price of a good, the less people will demand that good. In other words, the higher the price, the lower the quantity demanded.” Now, if it’s free, well, of course the customer will take it. Keep that in mind.
Professor Ian Gough, who has published on the subject of human needs in the context of social assistance provided by the welfare state, expresses that an individual’s needs are “representative of the costs of being human within society”. These “costs of being a human within society,” can be simplified to what people require to live in their social environment.
Now, in developing countries there is great need, yet much less demand. Why?
Many people who are suffering the conditions of poverty simply cannot “demand” things, because they are not able to afford them, thereby pushing themselves out of the market and into a class whereby what they would demand becomes simply a need. In most of these cases, the state, which should be meeting the basic needs of the poor when they are unable to afford or demand, isn’t.
Nonprofits, then, are compensating for a state’s weakness in meeting that great need for particular goods and services required to be a human within society. Most notably, they are meeting these needs for free.
So, it appears the statement that nonprofits focus on serving the “needs” of the poor, and not the “demands” of the poor, is accurate. Likewise, social enterprises, which are selling products or services to the poor, are focusing on the “demand”, since they have, somehow, been able to offer these products and services at a price the poor are “able” to afford.
Now, the million Shilling question:
If scores of nonprofits and aid agencies are currently meeting (or trying to meet) the needs of the poor, how is it possible for them to shift towards serving the “demands” of the poor?
How can social enterprises wedge themselves somewhere in between NGO’s “serving needs” and the BoP markets “demand?” You can’t beat free, donors will probably continue to pay, and marketing to the poor is extremely expensive, especially when you are marketing a product with margins and prices so low that the poor can actually demand it.
This, now, is where most people, myself included, fail to introduce an answer. Should nonprofits slowly begin to start charging the poor for their services? What would happen if they started instituting this? What would the drop off be in terms of those they are serving?
I’ll be looking more into this, since I honestly don’t have any answers yet, but in the meantime, take a glance at MIT’s Poverty Action Lab’s most recent publication, titled “The Price is Wrong”. http://www.nextbillion.net/blog/2011/05/06/the-price-is-wrong-for-some-things. The piece presents the results of ten evaluations on health and education programs from around the world, arguing that “charging small fees dramatically reduces access to important products for the poor”.
Fascinating…
Recent News & Press Updates
Hello!
The past month, though less jam-packed with travel than others, has nonetheless been another inspiring and busy month in east Africa. Since returning from Kenya, I’ve spent the majority of my time in Dar es Salaam, exploring more story ideas, publishing a few pieces, and cultivating several media partnerships for BoP content. I’m excited to announce that you’ll be seeing The (BoP) Project contributing regularly to Dowser.org and NextBillion.net, two prominent online resources and outlets for news, insights, and media in the Social Enterprise field.
Meanwhile, I’ve been working with Kujali International in Dar es Salaam to set up a solar kiosk for students of HOCET Secondary School, where students will run a solar kiosk in a rural, off-grid village, selling small-scale solar products from companies such as D.Light, Barefoot Power, Sunny Money and others, while also offering phone charging and energy-related services that are currently under-provided in the area. It’s been keeping me rather busy, but in the next month or two we should finish the planning and launch the business-and from there I’ll be most likely moving on from Dar es Salaam to base myself in my favorite east African city- Nairobi.
I’m continuing to experiment with the theme of documenting “potential” over “poverty” through the BoP Project, and trying to bring the point up in discussions more with east Africans. Do they feel the media is fairly portraying the region’s development? What are the negative effects of coverage of nonprofit’s work, and nonprofit’s own projection to the rest of the world of their own work? At the same time, I’m trying to understand the true perception of social enterprises among locals. There are many western-based social enterprises operating in east Africa, and I feel it’s important to get to know how locals view the notion of a “social businesses”, especially headed by expats, and what the perceived advantages over NGO’s are. I will hopefully have something up about this soon!
Anyways, here are a few pieces I’ve published or contributed to in the past month. Hope you enjoy!
NextBillion.net: “The BoP In Pictures: One Beekeeper, Many Hives In Kenya” http://www.nextbillion.net/blog/2011/04/28/the-beekeeper-joyce-kavinya-motunga
Dowser.org: “How Mafuta Sasa is turning waste cooking oil into clean-burning biodiesel in East Africa” http://dowser.org/bringing-biodiesel-to-africa/
Dowser.org: “BoP Slideshow: KOMAZA, innovations in microforestry and sustainability in Africa” http://dowser.org/bop-slideshow-komaza-innovations-in-microforestry-and-sustainablity-in-africa/
“On The Ground” (Kristof’s New York Times Blog): “Where The Grid Will Not Go”, By Josh Ruxin. Tuesday, March 29th, 2011 (The (BoP) Project Photo Credit) http://kristof.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/29/where-the-grid-will-not-go/
PhotoPhilanthropy: “Documenting Potential Over Poverty” http://photophilanthropy.org/2011/04/06/documenting-potential-over-poverty/
The Star (Kenya): “On The Coast, Money Grows On Trees” The Star Newspaper, Thursday March 17th, 2011
The Star (Kenya): “If There Is Sunshine, There Will Be Water” The Star Weekend Edition, Saturday, March 5th, 2011
Your Pity Is No Longer Required…
“Your Pity Is No Longer Required”, and other thoughts from Nairobi…..
He was a short and frail Kenyan of Indian descent in his early thirties with a bushy (and somewhat creepy) mustache and glasses, dancing at a hip Nairobi nightclub teeming with young Kenyans, Expats, and everything in between.
Up to that point, my whole day had been a reflection of just how powerful the city and people of Nairobi seemed to be becoming. The technology and innovations emerging from places like the iHub, the Kenyan diaspora returning after working or studying abroad to build the companies and the future of their own country, and the remarkable ambition, resilience and drive I felt in each of my encounters with the people of Nairobi, was driving some point home for me. I was creating a narrative in my head- despite the lack of infrastructure, despite the poverty, despite the political corruption, the city has so much untapped human potential waiting to be unlocked, and so many Kenyans hungry to thrust their country even further into the international spotlight.
Then I saw it. It was written on skinny mustache man’s t-shirt, in bold letters taking up the entire frontside of the shirt. “Your Pity Is No Longer Required”. I didn’t see the back, or the context, but I had seen enough.
The time for pity is over. The African narrative of the past decades- pictures and videos of fly-covered street children with dirt-clotted snot dripping off their face, plastic bags full of human excrement floating through flooded slums, horrendous images of poverty, stories of development failure and disaster- has outlived its purpose. YES, these stories and images highlight crucial problems, and YES, they get donors to hand money to the thousands of NGO’s trying to fix the same problems (albeit usually not together), but they simply show a one-sided story; one that doesn’t reflect the hope, power, and potential of a country on the edge of something bigger.
The story of Kenya, the narrative of development, is ripe for a makeover. Where are the stories of the young entrepreneurs? What about the students relentlessly pursuing an education to make their own future? Where are the stories of people overcoming amazing odds to make a name for themselves? I always wonder how shocked your average American college freshman would be be standing in the heart of a nightclub in Nairobi on any given Saturday evening, or spending an afternoon with a team of young entrepreneurs launching a new technology to change the way Kenyans bank.
“Your Pity is No Longer Required,” is in my mind a perfect motto for the new approach to development. The west has “pitied” the poor in developing countries, and offered solutions that sometimes marginalize, embarrass, or worst of all create a fundamental dependency on western aid.
Now, let’s be frank. This new motto is not to mean “your aid” is no longer required. Yes, NGO’s, humanitarian organizations, and large international agencies still have a massive role to play in assisting Kenya in building an infrastructure for the country and its inhabitants (water, health, sanitation, education). But this role should not be permanent, nor should it be led from the top down, and it ultimately should be done in tandem with the goals and work of the government, the people, and the private sector.
So today, start by throwing your pity aside. Instead of donating out of pity, begin investing in hope.
Begin searching for and sharing the stories, images, and narratives that reflect a country moving forward, not a backwards place in need of salvation.
There are many core areas that are failing and hampering development, such as clean water, access to sanitation, health services, and energy. These are ultimately perceived as the government’s responsibility, yet for multiple reasons (corruption, lack of taxpayers dollars, aid dependency) the government has seemed to fail, and the private sector needs to begin playing a more active part. That‘s why social entrepreneurs & social businesses are flooding into, and emerging from, Kenya. They are attempting to create profitable, socially beneficial industries out of areas where the government has previously, and continues, to fail.
Investing in the hope of a country like Kenya means investing- whether it’s time, talent, money, resources, knowledge, or training- in the young technology entrepreneurs, the social businesses, and the social entrepreneurs that will, we can hope, propel this wave forward and move the country in the right direction.
I’m working to do my part. The purpose of The (BoP) Project is not to document poverty. Most everyone knows what poverty looks like. They’ve either seen it in photographs, documentaries, or on the nightly news; witnessed it first hand walking through the streets if Mumbai, Mexico City, Bangkok, or even out the window of their van on spring break in Costa Rica; or, for over half of the world’s population, they’ve seen it because they live it every single day.
By sharing stories of social entrepreneurs, social businesses or enterprises, or simply young entrepreneurs in the developing world who blazing their own paths out of poverty, I am hoping to shift away from the common mistake of simply documenting “poverty”, towards documenting “potential”. That, in my opinion, will have a much greater impact on the global narrative and western perspectives of these emerging economies.
So let’s end this pity party and start focusing on the real problems, real solutions, and real narratives the countries. It will be a welcomed change, I promise.
The (BoP) Project Heads Back to Kenya & Uganda
Hello!
It’s about time for an update! It has been a solid month of working on pieces from my recent travels to Kenya, Uganda and Rwanda, and I’m just getting ready to launch a few new pieces- Indego Africa (Fair trade brought to a WHOLE new level..), Kivu Diary (a new venture from Rwanda Ventures, a for-profit social venture company launched by the nonprofit Rwanda Works), Rwanda Eco-Tours ( an innovative private sector approach to eco-based cultural tourism, which started the fascinating Iby’Iwacu Cultural Village, transforming the lives of former poachers in the Volcanos National Park, Rwanda), in addition to a longer piece on the new Social Business ecosystem emerging in Rwanda.
In other news, The Star, a national Kenyan newspaper, recently published The (Bop) Project’s piece on Grundfos LIFELINK in their weekend edition. For The (BoP) Project, this is a great accomplishment. While the project is directed at educating the international community about alternative approaches to development, social enterprises, and BoP ventures, it’s a privilege to have been picked up by The Star, in an effort, as the editor said, to bring more attention to companies and solutions such as Grundfos LIFELINK from the Kenyan government.
I’ll have a few new, exciting partnerships to announce in the coming weeks, but let’s just say you’ll hopefully seeing some more of The (BoP) Project’s photo essays appearing around the web soon 
.
Lastly, tomorrow I’m heading off to Kenya and Uganda again. I’ll be spending time in Nairobi, finishing documenting Honey Care Africa (a for-profit company improving the lives of thousands of rural Kenyan farmers through bee-farming), visiting PeePoople, Kickstart, Raise The Village, and perhaps a few more! I’ll be on the road for about two weeks, so I will try my best to keep you updated and am looking forward to publishing a few more pieces when I return back to Dar es Salaam!
Cheers,
Jonathan
Interview With Vijana FM….
Hello everyone!
I’ve been catching up on all of the stories and photos from my last trip, and haven’t had a chance to post much this month. I did recently do an interview with Vijana FM (“Youth FM” in Swahili), which I’ll share here. Vijana FM is a platform for visual, audio, and print content by the youth and for the youth in East Africa. They host a studio crew of volunteers and partners who create public discussion using visual, audio, or written media. They are working to become media-based platform for youth to share, exchange, and develop ideas for sustainable development in East Africa. Check them out at http://vijana.fm/about/.
Vijana FM: Five Questions with The BoP Project’s Jonathan Kalan http://t.co/4jyNUq2
The (BoP) Project Tales of Travel, Pt.#1
Click to see The (BoP) Project travel above or try this link.
4 Countries
42 Days of Travel
5,600 Kilometers of (Roads?)
170 Hours on Public Buses/Matatus/taxis
16 Enterprises/Organizations/Projects
(No ipod)
It was adventurous. It was uncomfortable. It was inspiring. A month and a half of documenting across the diverse social, economic, and geographic environments of four east African countries wasn’t the easiest thing I’ve done- but, by far, it was one of the most rewarding. Hopping bus to bus, sleeping on couches, tents, floors, and sometimes actual beds, I managed to meet some of the most incredible people, see some of the most beautiful places, and spend time digging into some of the most innovative models of social entrepreneurship Africa is offering the world.
I came across a diverse spread of interesting approaches along the way. Just to name a few- Micro-franchising essential health product distribution through Avon-Lady style Community Health Promoters by Living Goods; Solar Entrepreneurs bringing small solar technology to remote areas of Uganda with Barefoot Power; Educational products and materials for students and schools made from recycled materials by Mango Tree; Investing in health facility management and infrastructure at The Access Project in Rwanda; Carbon-Negative, income generating cookstoves (seriously… will have updates in April), from Inyenyeri; and a new model for the “fair trade” market that seems to go far beyond the notion just “fair” over at Indego Africa. Photos and stories from these, and many more, are on their way from The (BoP) Project.
Quick journey recap-I started at my home base of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and made a brief stop over in Nairobi for a few days to do some following up with a couple of organizations. From there, it was off to Uganda (hardly two days after the same bus was bombed by a grenade at the Nairobi bus station), where I spent a good three weeks traversing the country- from Tororo (east), to Soroti (central), Masaka (south), Kisoro (southwest), and much time in the capital of Kampala.
After plenty of time in Uganda (and an expiring visa), I set off for the most action packed week and a half in Rwanda I could have ever expected. Dairy farms, carbon-negative cookstoves, health clinics, fair trade cooperatives, and everything in between. I’ll write a separate post about Rwanda, but in short I found it to be an incredibly progressive and modern place, given its painful history not so long ago. President Paul Kagame’s nation-wide push towards entrepreneurship and active measures towards creating an environment that both fosters investment and holds NGO’s more accountable was extremely impressive. The country still has a long way to go, however it has come remarkably far.
Now, to offer a more somber reflection on this trip, for the better part of 42 days I found myself immersed in the cultures, customs, and conditions of those living at the Base of the Pyramid (BoP) in east Africa. I have shared with them tea, dishes of local food cooked over charcoal fires, dozens of stories and bumpy bus rides down seemingly impassable roads. I have spent time in their neighborhoods, villages, council meetings, and modest dwellings. In a short time I have gained a profound appreciation for their kindness, their openness, and ability to overcome adversity and the daily challenges they face.
