Bikes For Community Health Workers in Africa

Yesterday we told you about how bikes donated in the DC area are helping a youth project in the Mathare Valley, Africa. Today we will introduce you to Kijiji Cha Upendo in Kibera where our donated bikes are helping bring affordable health care to AIDS patients in Kenya.

Through a unique partnership with Wheels of Africa (WOA) and the Tour d'Afrique Foundation (TDA) several organizations in Kenya are receiving bikes indirectly from Bikes for the World. This series will bring you stories from several of them as well as actual bike beneficiaries.

Courtesy Kijiji Cha Upendo

Kijiji Cha Upendo (KCU) is a community based organization in Kibera, one of the largest slums in Kenya and Africa. Kijiji Cha Upendo complements the efforts of families already providing physical and emotional support, to orphans and other vulnerable children, infected and affected by HIV/AIDS.

The organization provides workshops, loans, food, education, support and empowerment to families affected by HIV/AIDS. They also help educate the community about HIV/AIDS spreading a greater acceptance of those suffering from the disease.

Mary Syombua

Some beneficiaries who received bikes through Wheels of Africa are using them to help transport goods to be sold. This saves time and money and helps benefit the family as a whole.

"I used to transport green groceries from the market place to my small kiosk, deep in the slum. I would hire a cart from the stage to my kiosk for Kshs 50. These days, I use my bike from the stage to my kiosk. "
                                      Mary Syombua

Agrippina Andati

 Others, use the bike to help care for an ailing household member. The one thing KCU beneficiaries all have in common is the transformational change that has been brought about by the bike. Some of these beneficiaries are infected with HIV/AIDS; all are all guardians to either orphans or vulnerable children.

Agrippina Andati uses her bike to pick up medicine for a sick relative. The money saved by using the bicycle allows her to better care for her relative. Agrippina does not know how to ride a bike, but her children use it to run these errands for her.

                  Ol Kalau Hospital Health Workers

Another health related project supported by WOA (and BfW) is in Ol Kalau, the central region of Kenya. Alongside the Peace Corp, Wheels of Africa dedicated ten bicycles to Ol Kalau District Hospital.
 
Bikes are used by these community health workers (left) to ensure that residents of Ol Kalau receive medication and treatment in collaboration with the district hospital and Peace Corps.

Wheels d'Afrique

Bikes for the World has over a dozen beneficiary partners worldwide. Each one of these programs we support is unique in how the bikes are helping their communities. We support a micro-finance project, school projects, community led bike shops, welding training programs, the list goes on and on.

In Kenya, we work with an organization known as Wheels of Africa. This project alone supports health related organizations, youth projects focused on keeping students in school, and locally owned and operated bike shops.

Some of the bikes donated by Bikes for the World are used in the partnership between Wheels of Africa (WOA) and TDA Global Cycling (TDA). TDA is a unique cycling experience that takes place in various locations across the globe. Cycling clients sign up for bike tours that travel through many struggling communities. TDA has made it their mission to give back to these communities by donating a bicycle for every rider on the tour.

The very areas the TDA pedals through are the same areas the Foundation strives to change. Bikes are typically donated to health care and community development workers.

In Kenya one such group is Maji Mazuri International. Maji Mazuri  was founded in 1984 to help women and children in the Mathare Valley.  Through WOA (and BfW) TDA donated bikes to the Mathare Youth Project last year. This project empowers young people from Mathare by training them in different technical skills.

Many students are sent to colleges far from their homes making the time and financial burdens of commuting too hard on their families. By providing a bicycle to these students, the Mathare Youth Project is killing two birds with one bike, so to speak.

"It (the bike) has brought about responsibility to me, to take care of it. It has cut on my fares and the distance I used to walk and travel. My younger brother also uses it to school,"
George Oluoch Okoth, Mathare Youth Chairperson.

The Tour d'Afrique bike tours are generating awareness and change to everyone touched by the ride.

"The cornerstone of social and economic development is awareness. The persons who participated in the Mathare Valley Tour have undoubtedly found themselves changed. While the living conditions that they witnessed in the slum are, to say the least, daunting, it is our hope that they were also touched by the hope and dignity that the residents of Mathare Valley gain from participation in the Micro Finance, Headstart and Youth Group projects. As the representatives of Tour d’Afrique met various members of the aforementioned projects, they can rest assured that that extension of interest and friendship further encourages those members," Wanjiku Kironyo, the Director of Maji Mazuri International in Nairobi, Kenya

...We will continue this series of change in Kenya through Bikes for the World partner Wheels of Africa over the next week on our blog. We will introduce another school group, medical projects, and a bike shop owner all benefiting from bikes donated through the TDA Foundation...