It was a big surprise for the staff at MABWOK and it couldn’t have been a happier day or worked out any smoother- and I say this with utter surprise myself, as I thought that surely installing 8 new computers and configuring them to the system in the slum is not going to be an easy task…But alas, it was one of the smoothest things/operations that I have had during my 8 months in Kenya! Was I ever thankful and impressed. CFSK technicians had the computers up and running within half an hour, and people were using them in the afternoon as a Cyber café, and MABWOK started actually making money immediately.

That is something I am proud of. I am proud and happy to raise money for a sustainable initiative. Through these computers, MABWOK will be able to offer Internet in Mukuru slum, something that is not readily available, and charge affordable rates to customers which will still make them a profit, which in turn can help sustain their other programs and their staff. They will also be able to offer a more hands-on IT training, as they were using 3 computers to train approx. 20 students. They will be able to offer more training to more students in the slum, thus increasing their opportunity for employment and livelihood.

I’d like to encourage people to donate to projects that have sustainable outcomes, which enable organizations to operate on their own and fund their own programs. MABWOK would love to be completely sustainable on their own initiatives, and any funding they get would be to put towards new programs and initiatives and trainings.

And that is my pat on the back to myself, and my Christmas present not only to MABWOK but to myself. Thank you to everyone who helped make this possible.

Merry Christmas everyone, and from Nairobi, this is my final post.

(photos: first is me, Joshua (head of the board) and a beneficiary, second is me and Philip, ICT instructor in front of the new computers.)

Victoria

The Forum declared a cautious hope for finance across the continent. While the global economic crisis has slowed progress, it was made clear that a deepening of financial systems and services can be observed within the continent. Growing regional integration and cooperation, as well as innovative approaches to help broaden access to financial services were cited as serving to create a positive atmosphere, and providing new opportunities for finance in Africa. Panelists at the Forum, however, focused largely on the significance of globalization and African integration into international financial markets as an important aspect of financial sector development.

Of course, the presence of global standards is important. However, importation and adaptation of financial sector solutions alone are not sufficient to make a substantial and sustainable impact on the availability of affordable finance in Africa. No single framework can fit all African countries. The solution to African finical sector development, rather, must be fit to Africa’s local circumstances, requiring changes in the politics of financial reform. In other words, we require homegrown solutions. Financial policies should follow “best-fit” solutions as opposed to “best-practices,” a concept so commonly employed within the field of development. What we need, is a political economy of development; not an inventory of best practices from financial institutions.

To this regard, the Forum suggested that there should be an increased focus on financial services and their users, as oppose to financial institutions. Turning unbanked segments of the population into bankable customers, however, involves more than pushing financial institutions down-market. Rather, educational programs are required. Education in the broadest sense, that is. The Forum highlighted financial literacy; knowledge about products and the capacity to make good financial decisions, as a chief component to African financial sector development. Work needs to be done within Africa to promote financial literacy in order to empower individuals to seek out financial services within their communities.

In considering the ongoing policy debates about economic development, this point offers a contentious opinion. It suggests a possible answer to what policy makers around the world; IMF, UN, WB are asking: what is the path to economic development? The appropriate response is not just access to international financial institutions, but programs to build social infrastructure to ensure that the benefits of globalized capital actually make their way down to people.

Interestingly, problematizing the bureaucracy of a top-down perspective, the Forum pushed for an increased bottom-up approach to the development of the financial sector, contending that drive needs to come from informed, self-directing communities.

Emmanuel Development Association (EDA) is a local NGO in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, committed to improving the lives of vulnerable children, youth, and women through integrated, community-based, and sustainable development programs. They are currently involved in a Livelihood Project entitled The Youth Venture Initiative: Harmonized Programs for Economic Opportunities. EDA has been working in conjunction with Street Kids International (SKI); a Canadian non-profit organization that helps street-involved youth learn to support themselves and make healthy, educated decisions to positively impact their lives. Since 2007, EDA and SKI have been working together in Ethiopia to provide small-scale business and entrepreneurial training, as well as corresponding finical literacy training to young people. The goal is to generate positive change within their communities, and the theory is that in aggregate, this will contribute to financial sector development.

In working with EDA, SKI embodies the bottom-up approach to development suggested by the Forum. In pairing with local NGO’s (Non-Governmental Organizations) around the world, Street Kids is able to adapt their approaches accordingly, and accommodate the vast and diverse needs of different communities.

In collaboration with EDA, Street Kids offers business education, start-up capital and microcredit support, while linking youth to community mentors and preparing them to access credit and support from community based microfinance institutions (MFIs).

The project aims at solving the problem of youth unemployment in Ethiopia. Lack of opportunity for youth is of critical concern to the economic development of the country, as Ethiopia has one of the largest youth populations in Sub-Saharan Africa, and, the largest population of youth living on under $1 a day (UN Youth Report 2005). Supporting youth then, through provision of training, startup capital, and consultancy services, is central to developing the country’s financial sector.

Marginalized populations often suffer from poor education and low literacy levels, and therefore do not know of, or understand the banking environment. Providing these populations with business and financial training therefore gives them the tools to access banks and other financial services. Financial literacy, and education, thus proves a key component to increasing access to credit.

Street Kids International demonstrates how financial policy can be aligned with poverty alleviation. The development of the African financial sector can create a positive environment for poverty alleviation by enabling economic access to those previously invisible to the market; encouraging entrepreneurship; and helping small scale businesses grow, thereby improving resource allocation, and increasing the potential to transform local economies.

Access to finance, then, is not an end in itself, but rather a means to an end. If the goal is to create deep economic development that impacts society sustainably, then we need to stop focusing solely on access to financial institutions while neglecting to create the social institutions necessary for society to benefit from them.

The work being done by Street Kids International, in conjunction with Emmanuel Development Association, is an example of this approach, and reflects these theories. Demonstrating how Canadians, and development practitioners, can properly engage in development without imposing Western hegemonic philosophy, SKI is simultaneously creating the environment necessary for financial investment to turn into human development and sustainable financial sector development, thus contributing to African political economy and Making Finance Work for Africa.

A shift in recent years has however, seen development resources deviate from hardware to software (local capacity and services) which has opened an array of opportunities for economic progress in a local context. One emerging trend is to invest in vocational training which can maximize employability through the provision of locally relevant, flexible and marketable skills. With a recognition that a substantial portion of the labour market in developing countries is engaged in the informal economy, donors and NGOs alike are seeing value in better skill acquisition for youth so that they can subsequently find gainful employment, or more often than not, establish their own enterprise. Thus understanding the local market needs is put at the forefront in promoting pro-poor economic growth.

Vocational Training in a Sierra Leonean Context….can it work?

HELP Salone, with the technical support from their UK partner APT and the financing of the European Union is currently one year deep in a three year Vocational Training Centre (VTC) project. Focussing on building the capacity of the institutions themselves, efforts have been made to improve the governance and management of the centres in addition to enhancing course quality. Working closely with Sierra Leone’s National Commission for Technical and Other Academic Awards (NCTVA), HELP is ensuring that each of the participating project VTCs will upgrade the quality of their curriculum and instructors delivering them, which will facilitate national accreditation – a critical component to youth employment which is missing from most centres across the country.

Building on our EU project, HELP, with the support of APT and Street Kids, will soon be serving an additional 3000 youth through a recently acquired World Bank Project. Using the improved VTCs as the institutions for improved learning exchange, the students will then receive Street Kids business training and subsequent loans to create their own relevant enterprises.

Promoting effective poverty reduction and economic growth through youth employment requires an integrated approach which appreciates the local situation and the local people. HELP’s method (with the assistance of Street Kids and APT) using market assessments to determine labour needs, improving the capacity of VTCs to facilitate effective skill acquisition and providing business knowledge with subsequent finance access could prove an effective use of donor resources to create a sustainable source of local capital which can contribute to the economic growth of the developing nation.

MABWOK is struggling financially and that has an effect on the staff as they have not been paid since June, when their funding contract finished with GOAL Ireland. We have been working hard to apply to various grants and competitions, but funding is scarce right now, everywhere. Most of my efforts have been focused on that for the past few months, and it surely is a discouraging position..though I’ve got my share of grant writing experience I was hoping for!

My hope for the future of MABWOK is that they can develop their social enterprise/business efforts in order to support themselves as an organization financially. My hope for the new intern is that they will also see the importance of this and will carry on what I have struggled to implement.

The project is designed to employ 15 youths at a time for a 6 month apprenticeship. During this period, the youths (at least 30% females) will be trained under Makiga Engineering Services, MABWOK and the National Cooperative Housing Union (NACHU), to produce Interlocking Stabilized Soil Blocks (ISSB) and learn how to use these bricks in house construction.

The ISSB bricks are an alternative building technology that requires a ratio of 14 parts soil to one part cement (regular concrete uses 5 parts aggregate to 1 part cement). The ISSB bricks are air dried rather than baked making them an eco-friendly and (overall) more affordable (when taking into account reduced labour costs and construction costs) for house construction compared with regular concrete or clay bricks.

The product that is to be produced by the youths will be sold to the people of Mukuru Hazina for housing. The youths will receive training in manufacturing ISSB as well as ISSB house construction. During their apprenticeship the youths will also learn entrepreneurship, financial literacy, and receive upgraded basic education. They will form a savings group and begin saving part of their wages- thus at the end of the 6 months they will be able to access credit for their own social enterprise.

To develop this project MABWOK will mobilize landlords and tenants to meet with their main partner on this project, NACHU. NACHU will assist landlords and tenants to form housing cooperatives where they can begin savings schemes to access affordable loans. The housing cooperatives will use their loans to buy materials and hire the youths at MABWOK to reconstruct their houses.

After the 6 month apprenticeship, a new group of 15 youths will be brought in for a 6 month period.The outgoing youth group will train the new group on the production and construction of the ISSB. The graduates will now have been employed and trained with a transferable skill and will now be more employable after their 6 month apprenticeship and MABWOK will assist in the transition from apprenticeship to jobs. Some may wish to go into business for themselves, based on the skills and the entrepreneurship training they received as apprentices.

In this way, MABWOK sees a brighter future for the Mukuru slum, where youths learn a construction skill and homeowners band together to build cleaner and more durable houses, providing socially responsible employment, and safe and secure housing: a sustainable solution.

The week previous to this, many of our youth had been organized into a group to prepare a dramatic presentation depicting the reasons why some of them find themselves on the street and the difficulties they face.  Each day that week, the youth showed up to practice their drama to ensure it would be perfect to present on Day of the African Child, their day.

Once at the stadium, the children all marched in and formed groups according to their schools.  Our kids however, due to the fact they were not in the march came in and some of them held their signs up in front of the stage (with other kids) while others congregated on the stands to watch all their fellow peers march and chant.  Unfortunately I guess some of the security guards were not informed that this years theme was “street youth” and as a result started harassing some of the youth to leave the stadium.  The pre-existing norms and beliefs surrounding street involved youth are often tainted and as a result lead to assumptions and accusations very quickly.  This issue however was smoothes over thanks to some of our social workers and thankfully the security guards completely backed off.

Each school was alloted a certain amount of time to present a prepared performance on the rights and issues street involved youth face, to a panel of community members, education and government officials sitting on stage.  We soon found out that our performance had been “forgotten” and that there was not enough time to squeeze us in.  Our team from Mkombozi was not happy with this and with a bit of negotiating, we were able to secure some time to allow our youth to present what they had so consciously prepared.  The drama did in fact go smoothly and a massive circle of other school children slowly formed around their performance showing support, curiosity and interest for what our street involved youth had to say.  The performance was both heartbreaking and funny as the youth acted out what it was like to be kicked out of their homes due to broken marriages, lack of money and resources.  Although the performance was cut short and continuously interrupted by the MC, who was trying to keep time, their drama finished with a roar of laughter and clapping leaving our kids with huge smiles on their faces.

Why were our youth not invited to the march?  Why were the security guards not properly warned and prepped for their duties that day?  Why was our time allotment forgotten about?  Why is it that The Day of the African Child had seemingly forgotten about its theme this year?  These are the questions I frustratingly posed to my co-workers as the events were unfolding around me.  The responses were always varied and unclear.  We even had a member of our staff sit on the team of board members that were responsible for preparing and organizing this event.  He was also extremely frustrated with the events that unfolded that day as he was very involved and clear in what our youth were preparing for the presentation.  The point of having this day was to address a real problem that many of Tanzania’s youth are facing.  In reality however, it was clear that the formality of the event was more political and righteous than the real effort.  Unfortunately this is the constant battle that not only our youth face with their government, but Mkombozi and most NGO’s face daily when trying to work for real change.   Overall despite the challenges, I think our youth really enjoyed their day and used this experience to voice their opinions, meet some government representatives and speak their truth.  They faced rejections that day, but none more than they face on a regular basis.  Watching 9-13 year old resilience and strength is impressive and will remain with me.