Project Underway

Two years later and I can finally provide an update on the Tanzania project. I am sorry to say that the original goal of building an office did not work out, which I will explain below, but I’m happy with the project that we finally agreed upon. The money is going to be used for small cooperative businesses among the members, such as selling clothes or fruit or raising chickens. The office would have had an indirect impact on the community by allowing them to recruit more members, but this plan will provide direct support and improve quality of living among members of WOFATA.

I don't know if I mentioned that WOFATA was founded in the largest city in Tanzania - Dar es Salaam. They have an office there where the founders work. Flora was the founder of the Arusha branch. The main office is the one who came up with the plan for the collaboratives. Their plan is pretty similar to what is done with micro-loans, where a small amount of seed money ($50-150) is given to three to five individuals who implement a small business and share the profits. I’m happy with it because it will address three of the major concerns I saw among members of WOFATA. The main issue is lack of support and opportunity for work among women. This allows them to branch out on their own by creating their own businesses. Nutrition is also an issue that impacts health and ability to work. With the additional income they will be able to afford more and better food and be healthier as a result. The cooperative nature of the projects also resolves the vicious cycle where a person with HIV/AIDS will get sick, go through all their money and belongings because they can’t work, recover if they are lucky, seek to borrow money to get reestablished, then get sick and lose it all again. Because they will be working in groups, they will be able to support each other if one partner becomes ill for a period of time without losing their business.

As for the office project, land was the issue. I was initially led to believe land is extremely cheap and we would mainly just need money for the building. This was not the case. It turns out Flora, the head of WOFATA, wanted to build the office on her property. I was not comfortable with that idea because if she had passed away her family would have likely claimed the office. My project coordinator then worked for about a year to try to get the government to donate the land, but wasn’t able to make it happen. I then had him start looking all over Arusha for the cheapest land and he looked at several spots over the next six months. The cheapest thing he could find in town was about $2300 for the land, which was about what I raised for the whole project. The building was still going to be another $2200. Even on the outskirts of the city it would have been over $1000, and they wouldn’t have been able to reach most of the city in those areas. Finally, I asked him to look into renting an office. Again, the central locations were about $100/month and up, which would have only provided them an office for less then two years. I felt like that was too temporary and might lead to them building up the organization only to see it collapse.

At that point I got into contact with WOFATA’s founding office in Dar es Saalam to ask what else they might be able to do with the money. That is when they told me about the cooperatives. They had already implemented a few with some grant money, but only in Dar es Salaam. I agreed to fund that project in both Arusha and Dar es Salaam and had half the donation money transferred to them about two weeks ago. Once they provide me with an update on the project I will either send the rest of the money to be used for more cooperatives or listen to their ideas for other projects.

So, I’m glad to finally be able to provide an update and have something underway. The good news is that the donations accumulated about $150 in interest during these two years, so that gives them a little more to work with. I think it will make a difference and hope that everyone who donated is okay with the change in projects. I did my best to try to get the office since that is what everyone donated money for, but felt like the money had been held too long and needed to be put to use. I have been getting occasional updates over the past few years about members I met who have since passed away and I felt frustrated by the pace of the project every time. The money is going to a good project now though. I have no doubt that it will prevent some deaths and greatly improve the quality of life of many members of WOFATA. I will hopefully post an update on the project in a few months once I find out how it has been going.