On Friday 31st January, the SIDshare committee and I started our fundraiser to cover the equivalent distance from Sheffield to Mt. Kilimanjaro (6400 miles!).
We began our challenge with the Sheffield Rounds Walk which starts in Endcliffe Park and covers Sheffield’s urban and natural environments.
Despite the rain, we completed the 19.3km in approximately 4 hours, which we were extremely proud of! We walked alongside the Porter and Limb brooks, through fields and encountered alpacas and peacocks- and Eddie only fell over once!
We are completing these miles to raise money for our partners at the Kilimanjaro Environmental Development Association (KEDA) and our collaborative cookbook project! It is an extremely worthy cause, that will help improve the livelihoods of the community in Tanzania.
We can’t wait to continue this challenge across the semester. Please keep following our social media accounts to see what we get up to next!
The United Nation’s 7th Sustainable Development Goal aims to ensure universal access to affordable, reliable and modern energy services by 2030. Efficient and affordable energy services are crucial to virtually all sectors of society, including health, education, agriculture, industry and technology. This call is influencing governments, individuals, research institutions and corporate bodies to facilitate access to clean energy technologies, focusing their time and energy on renewable energy options for the areas most in need.
Against this backdrop, Mobile Power’s unique, scalable technology seeks to revolutionise access to such clean energy in high-demand and under-served markets. Using a pay-per-charge rental model, Mobile Power supplies smart battery packs at affordable prices to low-income households. The smart batteries are charged at solar stations, then distributed by Mobile Power’s entrepreneurs to local shopkeepers who can, in turn, rent them to people in their communities. When the battery is low, it can be exchanged for a new one.
Image credit: Mobile Power
The idea originated in the Gambia and was designed in Europe, with several rounds of testing incorporating a cashless payments option and a cloud-based tracking system, which mitigates the risk associated with a rental system. By accelerating and expanding access to clean energy across emerging markets, Mobile Power is unlocking huge opportunities for businesses and education, simultaneously reducing carbon output.
Overall, it is projected that enhancing the number of children with access to clean and reliable energy will result in a significant improvement in learning outcomes. The project also creates opportunities for small businesses to thrive favourably, among many other potential positive gains.
Therefore, SIDshare is happy to be collaborating with Mobile Power, supporting their exciting project to drive access to smart battery packs to under-served markets.
Collaborating on the cookbook project: a visit to Tanzania
Blog by Tonisha Silver, Field Centre Co-ordinator
As the Field Centre Co-ordinator, one of our biggest projects this year is completing our Tanzanian cookbook. This project was inspired by Rufina, our head chef at the SIDshare/KEDA Field Centre in Tanzania. Rufina has been the head chef at the Field Centre since it opened in 2016 and, over the years, guests have always commented on how wonderful Rufina’s cooking is. So, we thought this would be an excellent way to share her recipes, increase awareness of both SIDShare and KEDA’s work and raise funds to support KEDA.
In November 2019, we were given the fantastic opportunity to meet and interview Rufina, our head chef at our field centre in Tanzania, to find out more about her life, her recipes and how the Field Centre has impacted her life.
The cookbook will contain 25 recipes, all given to us by Rufina, including starters, mains, sides, and vegetarian options too! Each recipe will have easy to follow, step by step instructions and substitute suggestions for local ingredients that might not be found in the UK. Throughout our stay, we were able to try several of the recipes that will be included in the cookbook. Personally, my favourite was the green gram stew (like a bean stew) with mashed matoke (plantain) and chapati. I was even lucky enough to be given a private lesson by Rufina and helped prepare lunch one day! We made fried chicken, fried matoke, chips and guacamole.
We were also able to show her the professional photographs that were taken last summer by University of Sheffield lecturer Gunnar Mallon and Ms Giulia Quagliozzi, that will be used for the cookbook.
The cookbook will be published in April/May 2020 and will be available to buy in several bookshops around Sheffield, as well as at the Field Centre. The cookbook will cost £15, and will contain a complete breakdown of what the £15 could provide for one of KEDA’s projects. All the money raised from cookbook purchases will go to KEDA to support them in their work around the Mt. Kilimanjaro region.
One of the things I enjoyed the most about the trip was getting to know Rufina and listening to her stories, about times she worked as a driver and a mechanic, and now both as the Field Centre’s head chef, as well as being a restaurant and catering company owner. The income she earns from working at the Field Centre has allowed Rufina to send her oldest daughter to university to study Procurement.
The week that we spent at the SIDshare/KEDA Field Centre was filled with good company, lots of laughter and delicious food. I look forward to continuing to work with the Field Centre and hopefully returning in the near future.
A reflection on our November visit to the Field Centre.
Blog by Eddie Conway, Field Centre Officer
In late November 2019, two representatives from SIDshare’s Field Centre Team had the opportunity to meet the people involved in a number of projects that the KEDA community group are running in the Kilimanjaro area of Tanzania. This was done as part of our collaboration on a cookbook of Tanzanian recipes, which we will talk more about in upcoming blogs.
Founded in 1992, the Kilimanjaro Environmental Development Association (KEDA) has worked for almost three decades to help local communities tackle environmental issues and combat poverty at its root. Two of KEDA’s founders, Mr Sabbas and Mr Shirima, took us to see a number of their success stories:
Tree Nursery
Originally horticulturalists by trade, one of the founders’ key missions was to bring a wide ranging variety of tree types to the local area. As part of this, they have coordinated a number of tree nurseries over the years to work in an ever-increasing catchment area. Since they started their work, Njia’panda has been transformed into a green, vibrant area.
The tree nursery we were taken to had been running for three months. Run by a local woman for the past three months, the nursery grew plants such as papayas and avocado trees with the aim to work as a seed bank of friend trees. These trees could then be distributed to other locals, enabling them to grow their own trees. In particular, we learnt that avocado trees are the ideal tree to grow in areas where individuals’ plot sizes are decreasing due to urbanisation. The fruit can be sold locally and internationally, and the trees can also be used for wood. KEDA works to advise locals on the best trees for high yields, like these.
The work of managing a tree nursery, however, is very labour intensive. In order to stop the plants from growing roots, each of the hundreds of plants has to be trimmed at its base every two weeks. In the future, KEDA hope to supply polythene sheets to prevent the friend trees from growing roots in the first place, alongside diversifying the different trees they will grow.
Goat-share Project
KEDA also help to co-ordinate a goat share project. In this project, KEDA go to local communities, looking to find who would most benefit from a donation of a goat (for milk production, food or selling on to others). The goat’s first kid would be passed on to a neighbour, the second to KEDA for them to pass to other communities, and the recipient would get to keep any subsequent kids to use however they choose.
Goats are often kept in raised wooden structures to prevent foot disease.
We met with a number of beneficiaries of the goat project, including the woman who ran the tree nursery, as well as Amina and Monica who lived in a rural village nearby.
Amina’s primary job was preparing food at her local street market. The provision of a goat has supplemented her income and enabled her to have financial security, as well as providing nutrition through drinking the goat’s milk. The goat project has been a runaway success and is expanding year on year with a hope to start providing an additional breed of goats to add to local diversity.
It was a fantastic experience finding out about all the hard work that KEDA does to help improve the local community and the successes that have come with that. The six days that we spent at the SIDShare/KEDA Field Centre did not feel nearly long enough, and I look forwards to returning to Tanzania in the future.
Monday 9th December: Digital Communications in International Development
Blog by Natalie York, SIDshare Communications Coordinator
For our latest event, SIDshare were lucky enough to host Beatrice Arscott from DFID UK to lead an inspiring workshop on how digital communications can be used as a tool in international development.
The afternoon began with a lecture discussing what exactly ‘communications’ are, before taking a more in-depth look at structural models for campaign planning, and finally touching on the ways in which DFID utilises digital communications. As our day-to-day studies in Geography tend to focus more on development theory, it was a refreshing addition for many of us to learn more about how international development operates in practice, particularly through the lens of DFID.
The talk was accompanied by an interactive element, where teams of students were encouraged to come up with communications campaigns for the lead-up to COP26 (The United Nation’s Climate Change Conference), presenting their strategies back to the group. Some of the challenges discussed included how to show UK charities that mitigating climate change is fundamental to poverty alleviation, and how to demonstrate to under-25s that climate change action is being taken. In addition to building anticipation for the high-profile conference to be held in the UK next November, the exercise provided an outlet for students to think creatively and pragmatically about very relevant issues, generating a number of thought-provoking ideas throughout the room.
A group of students presenting their COP26 campaign strategy (Photo: Natalie York)
Thank you to Beatrice Arscott and to everyone who came along – we hope you found this workshop as engaging as we did. Keep your eyes peeled on our social media pages for news about our next workshop! You can also register your interest in SIDshare (and become a member!) on our website – http://www.sidshare.org.uk – to receive updates about future events via our monthly newsletter.
An Independent Evaluation on Behalf of SIDshare and Kids Club Kampala
Blog by Abigail Upton, SIDshare Chair
In 2017, SIDshare partnered with Kids Club Kampala, Uganda to create a compost toilet in Navamundu. The project was completed by a mixed team of British and Ugandan members in August 2018 and since then, the compost toilet has been used and managed by the Women’s Initiative (set up by Kids Club Kampala) in Navamundu. The toilet showcased a partnership between SIDshare, a social enterprise linked to the University of Sheffield, and Kids Club Kampala and so, in the summer of 2019, an independent evaluation of the toilet was completed by myself, Abigail Upton, and Sam Blakeborough.
The evaluation was a success! The pilot scheme was found to be successful in numerous ways. We found that the toilet was structurally sound and the design had clearly been built to last. In Navamundu, the Women’s Initiative have promoted correct usage and this is a product of successful management of the compost toilet. Additional benefits of the WC Project were found to be improved hygiene and empowerment within the community. Furthermore, the by-product of fertiliser has enhanced crop production and therefore had advantages for the local economy.
The evaluation did have a few areas of recommendation. This included the belief that Kids Club Kampala should be given access to more documentation and posters – that way, lost posters can easily be replaced if necessary. Another recommendation was to allow local workers to build the compost toilet from scratch themselves, fully integrating this project into rural Uganda. Furthermore, we believed that more effective hygiene education workshops should be implemented in Navamundu – interviews in the field highlighted a need in this particular area for more education and knowledge.
Upon leaving Uganda, I was left wanting to come back already. The opportunity to be involved in evaluating the WC Project was an amazing experience, and I cannot wait to see how this project continues and evolves following the pilot.
Lucy Gosling
SIDshare 