Report from BHW Kenya Partnership Facilitators Following Visit

Key Person: Jacklyn Ogutu

We were able to meet with Jackie and her family in her home and Facetime the employee from the IT Centre and Jackie’s mother who is running the chicken project pilot. We unfortunately were not able to go and see the project and meet with the women. 

All is well with Jackie’s family; it was lovely meeting her husband and children. They have recently renovated their home and are doing well. 

Jackie is working on a manual with BHW called Foundations for Business which she is very proud of and excited for. This will cover business basics based on a biblical foundation.

Recent Events

IT Training Centre

The IT training Centre is going well and picking up business. The local schools are using them now for all of their printing needs. Unfortunately, since heavy rains knocked over the power polls, they have been having issues with the power cutting out, sometimes for several hours. When this happens, they are losing clients. They would like to install solar panels on the roof as a power backup.

If anything breaks down or needs sorting at the IT Centre, Jackie’s oldest son catches a night bus there, sleeps overnight and then repairs it that day. He stays a couple of days with his gran and then buses back for school. Two girls have requested being trained at the centre, but Jackie would like to get the reliability of the power sorted first. She hopes to begin training next year.  

Chicken Project

They have been running a chicken pilot project on Jackie’s mum's property with 50 chickens. This has proved successful, and they have been learning a lot about the healthy upkeep of poultry. They would like to expand this to 100 chickens and begin training women from the Table Banking program on how to also care for chickens and how they can be used for income and food security. The idea is that the women from Table Banking would pay a small amount for five chickens which they can use for eggs and an income. Jackie is putting together a proposal for this.  

Sanitary Pads and Health Programme

Jackie was connected with Beyond Waters by BHW who are building toilets and connecting water into the schools in which Jackie is working. They had to put the reusable pads on hold while the girls did not have access to water to wash them. The women are still making them in preparation for the water installation to be complete. In the meantime, Jackie has continued her health education and has been using disposables as a substitute. 

The guys have requested they too receive education and free underwear. This has proven to have a positive effect as there is still an issue of period shaming in Kenya. In fact, we saw numerous billboards from a group in Nairobi fighting to end this shaming in the country. 

Other schools have heard about the positive impact Jackie is having in the schools where she is working. They continue to request she comes to their schools also, but Jackie is wisely not taking on more than they have capacity for. 

Table Banking

Table banking continues to tick along with some groups functioning better than others. The most successful currently is made up of a group of teachers. She has a new group of 15 women she is meeting with next month. 

Partnership's Influence within the Community

The positive impact of the health programs is being felt in the community and the rate of girls staying in education has increased since she begun. 

Current Issues and Challenges

The two main challenges they are currently facing are:
- the need for consistent power for the IT Training Centre
- the increasing demand from other schools for the health programs

Ideas for the Future

Jackie has a request regarding solar panels for the IT Training Centre. Since heavy rains took down the local power polls the electricity has been very unreliable which is causing their power to shut off for up to 4-5 hours at a time. This is resulting in their clients having to go elsewhere for the service and they are losing business. They also cannot start training girls until the power is reliable. They would like to install solar panels as the cost to run a generator is too high and they have a sunny spot on the roof for the panels which has sun all day. The landlord has approved this also. 

The cost for this would be US$2,500 which includes solar panels, battery, change over switches and cables. The request will be presented to the BHW Executive. 

We are also waiting for a proposal from Jackie to upscale the chicken project. 

Prayer and Praise Points

Praise

1) Beyond Waters installing toilets and water into the schools so Jackie can continue her work more effectively.
2) The success of the pilot chicken project.
3) That a manual is being developed to help others in their business development. 

Prayer:

1) Continued wisdom, protection and favour over Jackie and her family as they continue their good work.
2) Wisdom for the IT Centre and the best way forward to solve the power issues.