Help Tanzanian Youth Make Tech to Help Themselves

Our Workshop never ceases to make Magic and this time around it hasn't been any different. 

We have hosted a number of youths through our Creative Capacity Building workshops, the incubation program and pupils through our build-it workshops. Saying our workshop is always busy is cliche since it has always been.

The incubation Program invited 9 amazing engineering students from different parts of  Tanzania who were passionate about developing the prototypes that were once made and left in our workshop. They underwent 3 months of intensive prototyping that led to the fruition of 3 technologies namely; the Winnower, the Sunflower Thresher and the Coconut Oil Extractor.

The amazing job done by these youths is remarkable because these technologies have reached a promising stage in which one (the winnower) already has customers even before mass production.

As part of the incubation program, our students/ innovators underwent a business workshop tailored specifically to equip them with the right skills and knowledge for them to turn their technologies into a sustainable business. We are hopeful that what has happened so far will lead to excellent businesses and ventures.

The Creative Capacity Building (CCB) workshop always has led to the birth of fascinating technologies and the ideas keep on emerging and materialized.

We  conducted two creative capacity building workshops with two different groups of youth who were sent by two partner organization (FUES Foundation and OKOA Generation). These two groups brought different project ideas which are still being worked upon in the early prototyping stage.

The project ideas includeWax mixing device, eggs collector, Dumpling steamer, Irish potatoes peeler and cutter, Vegetable and fruits solar drier, chicken plucker, maize thresher and coffee peeler.

The youths who took part in this workshop were so dedicated that they even came to develop their technologies weeks after the training. This shows how the youth have been inspired into becoming the change our communities do.

Our work is really never done until there is excitement from the young ones after they achieve making new devices. In December 2020, we worked with students aged 8-13 from different schools around Arusha who spent 10 days learning to make different devices like flashlights, battery phone chargers, rubber squeezers and blackboard dusters. After the program, their parents were impressed because the students could actually make the devices they were taught to make. We have also reached out to numerous schools with our LED intro program and they were excited to do more.

The reason we do what we do and more is through your continuous support. We are changing lives of Tanzanians, one Innovation at a time and we can not thank you enough for your support. It is through your contribution that we are getting closer to our vision of more local technological solutions to local challenges.

Thank you so much (Asante Sana!)

Nzira and the Twende team

Hi Twende Family,

I am delighted to write to you and update you with what has been happening at Twende. I hope that you and your families are healthy and keeping safe.

In this quarter, through your support, Twende was able to reach out to 80+ people from different parts of Arusha who attended different programs at different times.

Our programs have been diverse in many ways. We have gone beyond the walls of our makerspace (karakana) and we have been able to reach people in rural Tanzania as well. We have conducted 3 programs outside the Twende workshop that have been fruitful and a huge relief to the participants who were unable to visit the makerspace but the Makerspace also played its usual magic and hosted many programs, participants and visitors and in one way or the other given birth to impressive technologies made from the Creative Capacity Building Workshops, Build-It workshops, the Jamii Technology program and technical mentoring and advice.

We reached out to 25 secondary students through Dorcas, our partner organization working to help local youths by providing opportunities to learn different things to sustain their lives. This group got to learn how to build a bottle opener from a recycled piece of flat bar and made something they can add value and turn it into a business. Apart from making the bottle opener, they also got recycling ideas by seeing what others have done in terms of rubbish recycling, for example, the spirit stove made out of soda cans, flashlight out of recycled water bottles, and blackboard duster from small pieces of wood etc.

Thereafter, we conducted a Creative Capacity Building workshop which invited youths from different parts from Arusha, including some from the Arusha Technical College, as well as community members who joined to share ideas and get to build useful and workable prototypes which are to solve community challenges. This gave the students the opportunity to practice what they learnt in school by putting into reality and also the community and local youths learnt from them through sharing knowledge.

This quarter has been so fruitful that we have piloted the long-awaited Tech Incubation Program where we have started developing 3 prototypes into successful and saleable products. In this pilot, 3 technologies are undergoing prototyping and testing where the champions are teamed with young passionate professionals who'll work together to bridge the technology gap and eventually build a final product.

Apart from calendar programs, we also participated in some big exhibitions including Nanenane which was of great success as we reached many potential people who showed interest in our programs.

In terms of inspiring innovation, we hosted a chapter meeting which aimed to reunite all the Twende alumni to get to know and learn from each other whereby almost all of our innovators shared their progress and success stories and also got feedback on areas of improvement.

Twende also had a role to play in slowing the spread of COVID-19 where we made and donated 10 tippy taps to different public spaces and the project is still up on GlobalGiving (https://www.globalgiving.org/projects/support-local-tech-to-slow-the-spread-of-covid-19/) please support this project to strengthen public hygiene and slow the spread of COVID-19.

Through continuous support, we have been able to go beyond our makerspace walls and beyond our expectation. it is through your contribution that we are getting closer to our vision of more local technological solutions to local challenges. 

Thank you so much (Asante Sana)!

Nzira and the Twende team