Bikes for Ghana

This week we loaded our second container this year bound for Village Bicycle Project (VBP) in Africa. Our first was distributed to Sierra Leone and this one will head to Ghana.

Earlier this spring BfW bikes donated last year to Ghana were loaded onto smaller trucks and transported to rural areas of the country. The bikes were introduced to their new owners through VBP's Preventative Maintenance Workshop.

When container shipments of bikes come into Ghana they are offloaded and stored at VBP's main warehouse in Accra. They are then loaded onto smaller trucks and transported many hours to remote villages all around Ghana.

This particular shipment included 80 bikes donated by BfW. The bikes were transported to two different communities, one in Lawra and the other Kalsagri.

After a two day journey, the bikes arrived on site where three staff members and six trainers were ready to teach the workshop to eager villagers ranging in age from 13 to over 60. Each participant was chosen by community leaders. and represented workers, farmers, and students.

The mechanics would take a day to ready the bikes for the class. Participants in the workshop would be learning basic maintenance and care, like how to keep the chain free of grit and how to repair a flat tire.

Simon is a local mechanic

If someone signed up and didn't already know how to ride a bike, VBP staff members would also teach bike handling skills in this class. Since many guys already know how to ride, VBP started offering women specific classes, where they have a more relaxed setting to work with those novice riders.

One last detail of the class needed to be worked out before beginning. For each workshop offered throughout Ghana, VBP identifies and recruits local mechanics to assist at the workshop. This helps establish a relationship between the new bike owner and their local mechanic who will help them going forward with spare parts and more complicated repairs.

This spring, they brought on two local mechanics to help with training.  For their support VBP rewards each mechanic with a specialized tool set. Participants in the class would be going home with a bike. Each participant pays less than $25 for the workshop and bike.

From VBP: "This donation was very helpful to meet the critical needs of some people in Ghana's rural north. It was especially important for school children who have had to walk over eight miles to and from school every day."

They also report that the task of monitoring and evaluating the beneficiaries is a priority for VBP staff. They will continue to check in on, especially the students, to see how the bikes are affecting their studies.

The breakdown of BfW specific beneficiaries in these two villages are as follows:
     42 students
     15 small scale entrepreneurs
     22 farmers
       1 teacher

Catch-22, Meet Force of Nature

Mary Wiiyor is a young mother who took part in a Village Bicycle Project (VBP) Preventative Maintenance Workshop several years ago in the upper west region of Ghana.

Back then Bikes for the World Ghanaian parnter VBP noticed an important distinction...women really needed bikes, but many didn't have them. Some had never learned to ride a bike. Others kept having their bikes stolen from their male relatives or even other boys in the village.  It was a gender biased Catch-22.

So VBP devised a plan to empower these women one spoke at a time.  First they would teach them to ride a bike. Through their already established workshops, VBP staff and trainers could reach rural women and get them up and rolling on two wheels. Once a girl knew how to ride a bike her whole world opened up to change.

With her new riding skills a young woman could borrow her brother or father's bike and run errands more efficiently, maybe to go get firewood in the evening. Or to carry heavy loads of water.

All of a sudden these chores became, dare we say, fun. It definitely saved time and enabled her to carry more wood. It also allowed her to skip the dangerous practice of head loading, where women carry extremely heavy loads on their heads, sometimes injuring their necks and backs.

Meanwhile, VBP continued training men and supplying them with bicycles. And eventually the guys stopped stealing the women's bikes. Maybe they all had their own bikes. Or maybe they saw the benefit women brought to the family once they had bikes.

Regardless, VBP started offering bikes to men and women at all their clinics. And what they found was increased productivity in the village. Kids were going to and staying in school. Farmers increased crops. Budding mechanics found work.  And bikes just kept rolling year after year.

What they also learned is the girls really loved the work. They were good with their hands and were proud to own a bike. They learned how to properly clean and maintain their bikes. They could change a tire. Tweak their brakes. Some even learned more intricate skills to repair bikes.

Eventually, VBP started to offer women's only classes. Here the trainers could focus more directly on what the women really needed to improve. Without the, sometimes domineering, men around,  women were in a more relaxed space where they felt more comfortable asking questions and moving at their skill level and pace.

At the end of the class, the women received: a wire brush, screwdriver, tire levers, lube, a tube, and a pump. Oh, and a bicycle and the skills to ride it!

Today, Selina Abuakwa is not only the proud owner of her very own bicycle, but she knows how to ride and maintain it. Since receiving her bicycle from VBP in April of 2016 she is now financially independent.

Selina uses her bicycle to get to work and also for work. Her farm is about four miles from her house and it used to take her two hours a day to walk.

She now does that commute in under 30 minutes and uses the time she saves to grow more cassava! She also uses the rack on the back to carry the cultivated cassava directly to her customers.

With the saved time and extra income not only is Selina's life improved but so are the lives of her three children.

To borrow the phrase from REI Co-Op, Selina Abuakwa is a true Force of Nature.

Promoting Local Business

Rita Putebil Courtesy Jason Finch

Continuing our series on Village Bicycle Project (VBP) today we focus on the advanced mechanic class. Last year we introduced you to Rita Putebil, an 18 year old student who participated in the advanced class in Laabissi.

During training she asked questions and volunteered for every demonstration. She impressed the training team so much they stayed an extra day to show her further skills like pulling cranks and adjusting hub assemblies. VBP gifted her a set of tools and she is now maintaining the bikes in Laabissi.

Newly trained mechanics in Biama

Just last month VBP returned to the field traveling to three villages in the Brong-Ahafo Region. With the support of Re~Cycle VBP carried with them 260 bikes and 800 tools that would be distributed among participants in their workshops.

During the one-day workshops new bike owners learn every day maintenance and simple skills like how to fix a flat. People who have taken this class in the past are invited back for a more advanced mechanics class when the team returns. Some participants received their bikes over four years ago.

Local supply shop

Many local bike parts and supplies are very expensive, some hard to come by. Tubes and tires made for the American market are often of a higher quality rubber that they are preferred even used over the new tubes available in Africa.

This is why your donated parts, tubes, and tires are so important to Bikes for the World. We pass those on, packing them under cranks and between frames when we ship a container to Africa. VBP then ferries them across Ghana and into the local markets where your donated bikes end up.

New bike owners are taught only the basic upkeep of a bike in the one-day workshop. VBP trainers then pass along the local mechanic's contact information and encourage bike owners to visit them for the more extensive repairs. Promoting local business and mechanics is a high priority in the program.

Biama mechanic Maxwell

In fact during the recent visit to Biama, VBP trainers sought out the known local mechanic to invite him to the classes. They found Maxwell who was eager to participate.

Maxwell helped the trainers in class and then received further training that will help him in his business. He learned how to extract cranks, break chains, and adjust hub assemblies, just like Rita from last year. VBP also gifted him with a set of tools and promoted his business throughout the classes.

Biama, by the way, is known as 'the place where nobody will go'. Village Bicycle Project went, they taught, they conquered the complex workings of the bicycle and passed that knowledge on to keep your old bike rolling and in good shape. In case you were wondering, the 'rust' color in the photo above in not actual rust, it's Ghanaian dirt.

2 Wheels, 1 Bike

260 BIKES
800 TOOLS
360 PARTICIPANTS
13 ONE-DAY WORKSHOPS
3 VILLAGES
2 WEEKS
1 INCREDIBLY COOL PROGRAM

Bikes for the World has been working with the long established Village Bicycle Project (VBP) in Ghana, and now Sierra Leone, since we began shipping bikes in 2005.  Since then, we have donated 13,101 bikes to the project. One of our containers shipped late last year just arrived in Accra, Ghana and another is on the way right now. Since 2005 we have donated 28 containers to VBP-Ghana and another 3 to VBP-Sierra Leone.

Once bikes come into VBP's central warehouse location in Accra they are offloaded and reloaded onto trucks that will deliver them to remote villages throughout Ghana. VBP does more than just deliver used bikes, they offer beginner and advanced workshops to new and old bike owners in rural Africa.

This past February they loaded 260 bikes to be delivered among three villages in Ghana's Brong-Ahafo Region, about a day's drive from the warehouse in Accra. Bodaa, Biama, and Asiri all received bikes and training through VBP during this trip.

In Bodaa, 60 people participated in the one-day workshop offered by VBP. Because of their enrollment in the program, participants were able to purchase a bicycle at a significantly discounted price.

In Biama, 40 bikes went to a mix of farmers, teachers, and students. VBP trainers turned each one of these new owners into a mini-repairer, showing them basic bike maintenance and simple repair, like how to remove and replace a front tire and repair a puncture to the tube.

Evelyn Amoah

In the more populated area of Asiri, VBP distributed 160 bikes to new owners. These owners received their bikes along with this one day training class. They were also taught how to ride a bike if they didn't already know. Many young girls do not know how to ride, making this aspect of the workshop essential.VBP knows the importance of empowering a woman with a bike, like new owner Evelyn Amoah who will use her new bike to help transport goods to market from the family farm.

VBP also offers a more in depth advanced mechanics class as part of this rural outreach. Each student learns the more complex skills involved in bike mechanics from a VBP trainer. They are then able to purchase discounted bike tools that will enable them to help maintain the bikes in the community. Some participants in the advanced mechanic class in Bodaa actually received their bikes through the VBP one-day four years ago. Check back tomorrow for more on the mechanics trained in this project...

Women are the Hub of the Community

Bikes for the World partner Village Bicycle Project joined forces with Re~Cycle and The Bicycle Factory to celebrate International Women's Day in a unique and yet ordinary way. Put simply, they do what they do best, delivered bikes to remote villages in Ghana. This latest shipment helped empower many new female bike owners.

Village Bicycle Project (VBP) has been focused on getting bikes into the hands of women and young girls for several years now. To quote VBP, "the truth is, women run Ghana; they run the home, the compound, the neighborhood, the community, and so on..."

Many of our partners overseas have recognized the power of women within a family and community. Whether they are running errands, increasing product to market, or serving as the family school bus, women are using the bicycle to change their world for the better.

VBP kicked off February with a special delivery of bikes to the Suhum-Kraboa-Coaltar District. Actually, this was a shipment of brand new bikes to the students of Otwebediadua School through Cadbury's Bicycle Factory project. VBP taught these students how to ride and care for their new bikes.

In all 20  new bikes were delivered to the school. VBP introduced bikes to 15 students, 11 of them had never been on a bike before. VBP trainers, through their Learn2Ride program, taught these students basic riding skills as well as showing them how to care for their new bikes.

Asamoah Dorcas

In Ghana, women such as Asamoah Dorcas, may use a bicycle to help transport goods to market. Asamoah had been head loading heavy loads, which can cause spine damage. The bicycle will allow her to carry even heavier loads safely and in less time.

Evelyn Amoah is from Offuman in the Brong-Ahafo Region of Ghana. She owns a shop as well as helping on the family farm. The bike she received through the Re~Cycle/VPB effort will help transport crops from the farm to the town market, 5km away. "I will use my bike to take crops to the market," says Evelyn. Her daughters will also use the bike to get to school.

A bicycle donated overseas is often shared between family members and sometimes throughout a village. Because many women in these communities do not know how to ride a bicycle, the Learn2Ride program initiated by VPB is critical to empowering these women to better serve their families and create a better way of life.

The Right Tool for the Job

LEFT: Ghana. RIGHT: Springfield, Virginia. SAME container.

The Village Bicycle Project has been a long time partner of Bikes for the World. In fact over the last 8 years Bikes for the World has donated over 12,000 bikes to the project in Ghana and Sierra Leone making them our third largest partner (based on bikes donated). We have only donated more bikes to projects in Panama and Costa Rica, both now in the 15,000 range.

BfW bikes heading to Ghana's upper east region

BfW currently has containers on the way to the Village Bicycle Project (VBP) in both Ghana and Sierra Leone. Our last shipment to the project arrived in May and was unloaded into their new warehouse in Accra on the southern coast of Ghana.

From there, 240 bikes were transported north to the Upper East Region of Ghana where VBP was hosting a bicycle training program for three regions in June. To put the geography in perspective, the distance between Accru and Sandema, one of the villages where they were teaching, is 788 km or about 15 hours of drive time.

Basket weaver in Laabissi

For three weeks starting May 31, VBP would be teaching basic and advanced mechanics to villagers in three communities: Sandema, Nyobok, and Laabissi. The importance of the classes is to not only empower the communities that VBP serves, but to ensure that the bikes donated have a long, productive lives with their new owners.

Participants in the classes vary in age, occupation, and sex. In Nyobok, for example, VBP was shocked at the huge female turnout accounting for 72% of trainees. Most were farmers and then students.

Back in April VBP traveled to Laabissi and met the basket weavers who would be participating in the program taught in June. The bikes they received last month were all equipped with rear carriers to assist in carrying their finished baskets to market for sale. 80 women associated with this craft participated in the training programs in Laabissi.

VBP Program Coordinator Jason led the training programs alongside local trainers Sammy and Moro, both from the Upper East Region of Ghana. Not needing a translator made the curriculum much easier to deliver and grasp.

All participants paid a small fee to enter the program and received a bicycle from VBP for about $5 USD.

Upper East Region of Ghana

The landscape of this region is flat, dry, and very dusty. Everyone who took part in the Nyobok program requested 26" mountain bikes. You can imagine the maintenance that might be necessary to keep these bikes in good, clean working order. And as testament to the success of what is being taught, many of the bikes issued from the 2011 class were still in use.

Even more proof of how successful and anticipated the classes are can be seen in the attendance. Eager participants were gathered in Nyobok by dawn the day of training. The start time was supposed to be 8am, but they called for the trainers as early as 6am.

Later in the day, VBP offered a more in depth look into bicycle mechanics in their Advanced Class. Here participants learn skills like wheel truing and bearing assemblies. They are also offered hand tools at a 50% discount. There was such a huge turn out VBP ended up holding two classes instead of one and had to bring in more tools from the warehouse.

Jacob and Emmanuel came out to help VBP with training in Nyobok. Emmanuel's wife received a bike during the last training session. Jacob is in his early 20s and he also helped last time. The VBP trainers saw a huge improvement in his skills from before. Both local trainers were gifted with bicycle specific tools for assisting.

Pelungu is the nearest market town where bike owners go for parts and repairs. Francis, the local mechanic there, runs a large workshop with a staff of twenty. VBP is suggesting Jacob train under Francis to become an actual bicycle mechanic.

Young student learns how to loosen handlebars

VBP continues to focus on teaching females not only how to ride a bicycle but how to care for them. In Laabissi, one young woman caught the eye of trainers. 18 year-old Rita Putebil joined the Advance Class and volunteered for every demonstration and excelled in all the practicals.

Later that evening they invited her back and introduced even more specific tools such as the crank-puller and chain-breaker. Training with these types of tools is usually left for local bicycle repairers. VBP gave Rita her own set of tools before tasking her with the challenge of caring for the 80 bikes delivered to her community by VBP.


Dispatch 32: Simon, What We Learned from Ash Dumford on Vimeo.

Where Is Your Old Bike?

NOVA Meet Up group loading at Springfield in March

Did you donate a bike at REI last spring in Virginia? There is a good chance we can tell you exactly where it went! Donors often ask where their bikes are going when they drop them off with us, but we can rarely pinpoint it at that particular moment. If you continue to follow our progress, however, you might just find out...OR better yet even see your bike!

Team in Ghana who unloaded the container

Back in March we loaded a container bound for the Village Bicycle Project in Ghana. We were cleaning out our Springfield trailers and the NOVA Meet Up group (photo above) came out to help us finish the load.

Two months later the container was in Accra being unloaded by the crew to the left. The Ghana team is Moro, Abokyi, Jason, Sammy and Tofic with local retailer Adi, outside the new warehouse. This was the day before our container arrived...the first one to be unloaded into the brand new warehouse.

Earlier the same week the Village Bicycle Project moved what was left in the old warehouse to their new permanent one in Accra. From their facebook page:

After relocating bicycles in Ghana for 13 years, and working out of multiple lockups and storage units, we finally signed the deed on our own warehouse space. Centralizing our distribution means we're going to be better prepared and much quicker at responding to applications.

A huge thank you! to all our supporters who helped make this happen! Today we moved 200 bikes from one of our importers and worked long into the night. We're all pretty exhausted...

Then came the container from Bikes for the World Springfield, Virginia.

Once again, here's the recap:
March 15, 2013- You uncovered your unused bike in your garage to donate Saturday

March 16, 2013- Your old bike was donated at REI in Fairfax Virginia

March 18, 2013- After being loaded onto a shipping container earlier that weekend your old bike was transported to the Port of Baltimore where it would leave on its sea journey to Africa

May 16, 2013 Village Bicycle Project finished moving their warehouse contents into a new facility in Accra Ghana

May 20, 2013 The Ghana team seen above was gearing up for our container the next day

May 21, 2013 Bikes for the World container was unloaded into the new warehouse in Ghana

May 25, 2013 Some of those bikes were transported to Ghana's Upper east region for a training program

June 17, 2013 Bikes sold to participants in the program for $5.00 USD (update on blog coming soon)

You gotta love facebook. We are getting real time updates from some of our partners. Don't believe me? You can watch the whole container being unloaded right here (you might even see YOUR bike):

Dispatch 36: Container Unloading from Ash Dumford on Vimeo.

We Did It!

In the past four weeks Bikes for the World handled close to 10,000 bikes. It wasn't so long ago when 10,000 bikes was an entire year's work! But I did say handled, which includes shipping as well as receiving. So basically in less than a month we filled up a warehouse then emptied it back out again. Really.

 You may recall how excited we were to move into our new location more centrally located in Arlington. We had big plans. More volunteers, another volunteer day, dual shipments....We loved the idea of having electric and restrooms. We'd be Metro accessible. We had a covered dock and multiple doors...

We took possession of the facility in late April and immediately started bringing collection bikes into this warehouse. In fact our Operations Manager, Nick Colombo loved driving right into our storage location so much, he began bringing ALL of our bikes here, even the ones from Maryland (which would normally go to King Farm).

This new warehouse was going to make this year's DICK'S Sporting Goods promotion run as smoothly as a high performance track bike! We were expecting over 5,000 bikes from the national retailer and we were ready.

We hired a part time staff. Devised a busy but reliable weekly unload schedule and in turn a comfortable, nicely paced shipping schedule. We put out the call for volunteers and started scheduling corporate groups to help us load.

And the bikes came pouring in, as we predicted. In just two weeks, our warehouse was filling up fast. We had decided not to ship earlier in the month to focus on bringing in, unloading, and processing bikes. In hindsight, this might have been a mistake.

What that meant was, we expected over 6,000 bikes in this location alone, counting the local collections in addition to the nationally collected DICK'S bikes. No problem, we had this warehouse until at least the end of July, probably longer.

May 31, 2013.
This is when we got the call. Even though we anticipated a late summer move, our lease with Vornado was month to month. And there was movement on the property. The grocery store chain moving into this location wanted to be in by 2015 and they still had to tear down the old BMW place we called home for a month.
We had to move. 3,000 bikes. In a month.

Luckily the warehouse right next store was empty and Vornado offered it to us as an alternative. We stopped bringing bikes into 1200 S Eads immediately and for the next three weeks we brought the remaining DICK'S bikes into the adjacent warehouse 1420. We also diverted two trucks to Chicago's Working Bikes and St. Louis Bicycle Works...there was plenty to go around.

This would ease our stress to ship in July because we would have the use of this new location through the end of the year. But we had 4,500 bikes sitting next door and they had to be gone by July 1st. Time to rework the shipping schedule!

We started June 14-15 with a container for Barbados. The corporate group from PBS did such a great job loading it we actually had to cancel the group coming the next day because we didn't have enough left to do. This made us rethink the rest of the schedule.

The following week we scheduled THREE containers in ONE week. The next, FOUR! We invited PBS back and they didn't disappoint. The group from GMU/US State Department (seen left) finished the first of the last four containers and started another one at the same time for Kenya. Then we did another Kenya and finished up with one heading to El Salvador.

The bottom line is we had an impossible job to complete...and we did it! We moved a ton of bikes in those last two weeks of June. Over 50% of the bikes we've donated so far this year have been shipped from this 1200 S Eads warehouse. 4,637 bikes total. Besides one container for Costa Rica that was loaded in May with 506 bikes, we did it all in the month of June. Over half the bikes we've shipped this year (8,013) happened in the last two weeks of June 2013. Monumental to say the least!

Somebody call Guinness, if it's not a world record it's at least worthy of a toast! My Goodness. Brilliant!

A Perfect Record

BfW shipment to Wheels of Africa, Kenya

Each country we ship to has a different set of rules and regulations. And the cost of shipping varies from one location to the next. A country such as Panama might only cost a few thousand dollars to ship a container of bikes while Uganda will cost three times that.

One of the reasons we choose our international partners carefully is to ensure our shipments arrive safely. One of our main criteria is that they have a proven track record of getting shipments successfully into the country. A hang up could be the port authority or government, and that could create insurmountable issues clearing customs.

Shipments going into Kenya and Uganda both pass through the Kenyan port of Mombasa. You can see from the map to the left that Uganda is still very much inland from this port. A container of bikes from the Port of Baltimore to Mombasa may cost $5,000 US. However, to move those bikes from the Kenyan port to Uganda by truck will cost another $4,000.

If the government were to impose an import duty on these donated shipments, those costs could soar upwards of $15,000, for a container of 500 used bikes! This could impact our relationship with Uganda. And this is where we are now.

Courtesy Prisoners Support Organisation

In fact, our latest shipment to Uganda suffered an even worse scenario. This was our 27th shipment to the Prisoner's Support Organisation (PSO) in Uganda. When it arrived at the port of Mombasa, it was pulled aside by the Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA). Up until recently, we had no major issues clearing the port and moving inland, via truck, to the Ugandan capital of Kampala. This time, however, the PSO's shipping agent was told that the KRA had determined that our shipment was mischaracterized on the bill of lading-the critical shipping document-and that we would be fined, held responsible for the costs of unloading and verifying contents, and charged for storage. The alleged issue was that the KRA considered the bikes to be 'assembled', and not 'semi-disassembled', as we have consistently stated on our shipping documents.

May shipment of BfW bikes in Ghana

Upon learning of the problem from our local partner, PSO, we responded that the KRA position was in error, that our bikes-with their pedals removed, their handlebars turned and rotated, seats down, and sometimes with wheels removed-were indeed 'semi-disassembled' as stated on the bill of lading, and that neither we nor the consignee were responsible for any costs incurred. "Try and ride one of our compacted bikes!" If they were not ride-able, they were surely not assembled.

BfW shipment of bikes arriving in Colombia

A few weeks later, we received the gratifying news that the KRA-which has inserted itself into a matter we considered best left to Ugandan authorities-had dropped the fine and associated charges, and the container had already proceeded on to Uganda.

After 150 shipments, going back to 2005, we have never yet 'lost' a container (and its contents) to abandonment and confiscation.

In large part, this is due to the commitment and competence of our receiving partners, who research import requirements, hire a freight agent, and move quickly to clear the container from port before storage costs begin to mount up. Another reason is that Bikes for the World commonly requires that its receiving partners pay a portion of direct costs ahead of time, making them 'invested' in the shipment and motivating follow up.

May BfW shipment to Village Bicycle Project, Ghana