Greetings all,
A couple weeks ago Peter Morrin set off on another African development expedition. He spent 2 weeks in Uganda and is right now on his way to visit ImaniVocational Training Centre in Tanzania for approximately one month. This will be Peter’s third time visiting Imani and the second as our representative on the ground. Having run an engineering company for many years, Peter has a wealth of experience that is helping to improve existing projects at Imani, implement new initiatives, and work closely with our partners at Imani to map out the strategy moving forward. As it has been in the past, the focus of our efforts is to help Imanimove towards self-reliance through the implementation of food- and income-generating activities. Imani, meanwhile, remains focused on providing vocational education to disabled and non-disabled youth and to equip them with the tools they need to support themselves in the future.
This year Peter will be focussing his efforts on three main initiatives as follows:
1. Chicken Operation - construction of elevated grating, feed troughs and water troughs, purchase of new batch of chicks
Previous efforts to build a successful egg-laying business at Imani ended unsuccessfully after disease wiped out much of the flock. Fortunately the building we built for this purpose remains fully intact, and Sister Adela, director of Imani, continues to see the chicken operation as economically viable. We have consulted experts both in Canada and Tanzania and have identified ways to prevent similar problems in the future. While in Tanzania Peter will be working with Imani to build a grating system that will elevate the chickens off the ground, new food and water delivery systems, and purchasing a new batch of immunized chicks that will develop into laying chickens. We expect to spend about $2000 on this project.
2. Carpentry Building - inventory control, workflow management and market development
The large carpentry workshop which was financed largely by those of you receiving this email is fully operational, and is well stocked with the raw lumber for student projects. In additional to producing and selling furniture to the community, the workshop also generates revenue by providing carpentry services (eg. cutting, planing, etc). Upon Peter’s visit to Imani last year he and Sister Adela identified as an additional area of need the improved control of people, inventory, raw materials, orders and tools. Improvements in these areas will come both from the implementation of new tracking/receipting/accounting systems and the potential construction of small reception counter, steel grate door or other physical barrier. They will also continue to explore various avenues to develop additional markets for Imani-produced furniture. We expect to spend about $1000 on this project
3. Internet Service - installation and activation
Communication has always been a challenge when working with Imani, mostly because the school is located in a rural setting with no internet service and minimal cell phone coverage. Over the past year Peter has researched various options to help improve the situation, and has identified the mounting of a small antenna tower at Imani as the best option going forward. This will allow those at Imani to access the internet without travelling into the city of Moshi. Sister Adela will be able to communicate more frequently and reliably both with us and with other potential partners, and will give internet access to any visitors to the school. While the internet service will initially be intended for the administration team of Imani, it could one day be offered to the students and/or used potentially as a small business opportunity. For now, Peter and Sister Adela’s job is to get it up and working. We expect to spend about $1000 on this project.
In addition to the above projects we have set aside approximately $1000 for Peter to spend on an assortment of small improvements/repairs, pilot projects and other incidental expenses.
As you can see from the above descriptions and cost estimates we are no longer making major investments in large infrastructure projects as we have (successfully) done in the past. Rather, we are investing smaller amounts of money to refine and improve existing initiatives in order to make them more stable and profitable.
On behalf of Peter Morrin and myself I would like to thank you for your ongoing interest and support of this project. If you would like to make a donation to help us continue the work we are doing you can do so at http://cacha.ca/donate. If you are donating via Canada Helps, remember to select “Imani Vocational Training Centre” from the dropdown menu beside Fund/Designation.
Safe, happy and productive travels to Peter, who will be sending updates of his time in Tanzania and will provide pictures of the progress to date.
Sincerely,
Greg
