Kibera Agenda Web Launch and One Year Anniversary Celebration

Uweza often works closely with other local organizations in the community, and with this post we wanted to highlight one of our partners, Kibera Agenda. Kibera Agenda is a savings and loan group that is comprised of residents of Kibera who have organized to save and provide small-scale business loans to other Kibera residents. Uweza partners with the organization to provide loans for some of our sponsored childrens' parents. Often times, Uweza is able to provide for the educational needs of a child, but they still struggle with their family situation at home. Kibera Agenda has assisted to provide loans to some of these mothers of our sponsored children, so they may excel in business and provide for their children.

Recently, Kibera Agenda had a launch party celebrating one year of working in the community of Kibera. The group invited all of its current business loan participants to join in the celebration at a Scouts Camp located next to Kibera. During the celebrations, the participants of Kibera Agenda were given opportunities to receive free loan repayments through various games during the day. We are proud that two of our students' mothers, Mama Mulinge and Mama Norman, received a free loan repayment for scoring goals during the woman's soccer match!

Kibera Agenda will soon have a website to show their work at www.kiberaagenda.com. We are continually thankful for their partnership and support of our sponsorship program.

Members of Kibera Agenda at the launching of their first anniversary working in the community of Kibera



Goal-scorers in the women's soccer competition, including Mama Mulinge and Mama Norman in the center, who received a free loan repayment amounting to 10% of their current loan balance.

New scarves!

A new batch of Kenyan scarves has been added to the Uweza Shop just in time for fall and the holidays! They are $10 each and we have eight different colors.

The scarves have sold out pretty quickly in the past and limited quantities are available so snatch them up while you can!
http://uweza.org/shop.html

Uweza 2009 Financial Report

We strive to be transparent to donors and to keep donors as involved as possible in what is going on with our work in Kenya.

We have just published our financial report for 2009. It provides a description of our program accomplishments and a breakdown of how donated funds were spent. Check it out HERE.

In 2009, we focused our efforts primarily on our health outreach, sponsorship and orphanage programs. 2010 has seen a shift in our programmatic priorities and a change in a few of our projects. We expect to continue changing as an organization as we learn how we are best able to make an impact and reach those in need in Kibera. Our work is often reflective of the performance and priorities of our Kenyan colleagues and feedback from program recipients. We consider their involvement crucial to our success, as they best know their community.

We are currently working on a similar report for the first half of 2010 so expect that soon.

As always, thank you for your support!

iCow, Flip Flops and Other Kenyan Innovations

Visitors to Kenya—or indeed, to anywhere in Africa—are often impressed by the people’s energy, entrepreneurship, and ingenuity; the most intractable problems are tackled with a creativity and humor that I am continually humbled by. I’ll try to include examples of this in the blog as much as possible.

One of my favorite stories this week is about the winner of the “Apps 4 Africa” competition. Kenyan Charles Kithika emerged victorious with his “iCow” application, which helps farmers maximize the breeding potential of their cows by tracking the animals’ fertility cycles. The program is voice-activated, so anyone with a basic mobile phone (and that’s everyone in Africa these days) can use it. What a brilliant and simple use of mobile technology to improve people’s lives.

Could high speed broadband internet transform the Kenyan economy? With the long-awaited installation of broadband connections earlier this year, East Africa is finally wired and ready for business. Kenya is currently attempting to stake its claim in the vast market for international business outsourcing. Read more here.

Considerably lower tech, but no less exciting and inventive, is the artistry of women in northern Kenya, who collect hundreds of discarded flip flops and use them to create beautiful toys and ornaments. This charming video tells the story of the women (and the flip flops) while capturing some of the rhythm and flavor of coastal Kenyan life. Watch it here:


US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently announced a $50 million initiative to promote “clean” stoves in Africa. Most African women cook over open-flamed, wood-burning stoves, causing rampant health problems and speeding deforestation and climate change. Read about Why Clean Stoves Will Help African Women, and learn more about the challenge of changing Kenyans’ attitudes towards cleaner energy sources.

Counselors September Report

Click HERE to read the Uweza counselors September report.

Kenya and Kibera Current Issues Series - Week 2!

This week I’ve put together a mixed bag of links--so much coverage of Kenya and Africa is negative, so I try to collect links which reflect not only the struggles but also the achievements and limitless energy of the people. I hope that you enjoy the links, and I look forward to any feedbacks and suggestions.

• Kenya has shown improvements in health care and gender equality, but continues to suffer from large-scale corruption, poor infrastructure, and a failing education system, according to the 2010 Ibrahim Index of African Governance country rankings, which were released earlier this week. Learn more about Kenya’s performance in the Ibrahim Index and read an op-ed from Mo Ibrahim himself, a Sudanese telecommunications mogul on a mission to improve governance in Africa.

• Uweza isn’t the only organization to recognize the importance of sports and recreation as a tool for development. On the sidelines of the 19th Commonwealth Games, currently underway in Delhi, India, various officials are meeting to discuss the role of sports in achieving key development goals. Learn more about “Why Sport for Development Matters.”

• According to a recent Human Rights Watch report, most children in Kenya who have illnesses like HIV/AIDS and cancer cannot access pain medicine. Watch this short video about Jethro, a five-year-old from Kibera who was HIV-positive but did not receive the pain medicine he desperately needed before his death.

• The lack of adequate water and sanitation systems in the slums of Nairobi contributes to the spread of diseases like malaria, typhoid, and cholera. Read more about the connection between public health and sanitation here.

• Could the next winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature be a Kenyan? Novelist and activist Ngugu wa Thi’ongo is currently bookmakers’ favorite to be the next Nobel Laureate in literature. This thoughtful article talks about Wa Thi’ongo’s accomplishments and how literature can be a powerful catalyst for development.

Uweza Shop Look-a-likes

Two times in the past month, I have spotted items in the store that are very similar to jewelry that we are selling through our Uweza shop. But of course each of our pieces is handmade by woman from Kibera, one-of-a-kind and much more reasonably priced!

Store brand

Much better Uweza shop version!

Store brand

Uweza shop version!

Please visit the Uweza shop: http://uweza.org/shop.html to purchase jewelry made by HIV positive women. 100% of proceeds will go toward direct assistance and program development to sustainably support these women.

New weekly blog feature: Kenya and Kibera Current Issues Series

This week is the first in a new blog series that will be guest written by Amy Auguston. Amy first volunteered in Kenya in 2007. That year, she organized and financed weekly soccer lessons for the boys at Tunza Children's Center in Kibera and this project was later incorporated into Uweza to become our soccer league. She has also sponsored a student through our sponsorship program. She recently finished an 18-month stint managing a development project in Dodoma, Tanzania. She has an MSc in Development Studies and has worked on Africa-related issues with organizations including Human Rights Watch, EngenderHealth, the African Human Rights Consortium, and The Rory Peck Trust.

Below is her first blog post and she will continue to write a weekly post to keep us educated and informed about current issues affecting Kibera and Kenya.
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First introduced in 2000, the UN Millennium Development Goals (or MDGs) outline a comprehensive and ambitious vision for social and economic development in the world’s poorest regions. The MDGs provide obtainable guidelines to reduce worldwide poverty by 2015. Last week in New York, leaders from around the globe gathered at the UN Summit on the Millennium Development Goals to evaluate and discuss the progress made so far as well as what needs to be accomplished in the next five years.

Below you’ll find some MDG-related coverage of issues facing Kenya and the rest of the developing world:

• Kenya’s top newspaper Daily Nation assembled a detailed round-up of Kenya’s progress—or lack thereof—towards achieving the MDGs. While Kenya has made significant strides towards some goals, there has been insufficient progress in other areas, including child mortality, maternal mortality, and HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria.

• “The lack of African voices at the MDG summit was both notable and troubling. Learn more about efforts by Africans to address African issues here .

• What happens if the MDGs aren’t reached in 2015? As one development expert asks, “If we miss the goals, who is going to punish us?” Read more about accountability for the MDGs here.

• Kenya’s own Wangari Maathai, who is the first African woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize, and Mary Robinson, former UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, published an impassioned editorial about the importance of involving women and girls in issues of environmental sustainability (MDG #7).

• MDG # 5 aims to reduce maternal mortality and to improve maternal health in general. Obstetric fistula is one of the common—and most devastating—childbirth injures in Africa. In a recent report, Human Rights Watch spotlights the plight of Kenyan women with fistula and the failure of the Kenya’s health system to prevent and repair this condition.

• A recent World Health Organization study reminds us that the fight against HIV/AIDS (or MDG #6) is far from over. The target for universal access to ARV treatment in the world’s poorest countries has still not been reached.

East Africa Cup Tournament Results

Last month, three of our teams participated in a three-day tournament with teams from throughout East Africa.

Each team played in 4 matches. The Under-12 team won one match and lost three. The Under-14 team also one one match and lost three. The Under-18 team won one match, drew one match, and lost two.

Although they were not victorious, the boys did their best and all had a great time and it was a really good experience for them to interact with players from throughout Kenya and all of East Africa. When they weren't playing, most of the boys spent the whole day at the tournament watching other teams play. We provided all of the boys lunch every day as well.



A photo gallery of the tournament has been posted on our photo page: http://www.uweza.org/framephoto.html

We recently bought new sets of uniforms for the teams, including a set of pink uniforms for a new girls team so check back for more info and pictures soon!

Bar Mitzvah for Uweza

Recently, we were fortunate enough to be chosen as the recipient for a Bar Mitzvah Project coordinated by a young man named Nathan Lee and his family. Nathan celebrated his Bar Mitzvah in June and asked attendants, family and friends to donate to Uweza as part of the celebration.

Following the Bar Mitzvah, the family traveled to Africa for an eight week trip, starting in June. They visited and worked with members of the Samburu tribe, who reside in a rural area of Kenya north of Nairobi. They are working with members of the community to help gain education for their children.






It's really inspiring to see someone Nathan's age already giving back to those in need and we are honored and grateful to him and his family for letting us be a part of their efforts.