Mombasa Artists for Change (MAC)
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Eco Ethics International Union-Kenya has been working for over one year with ten registered youth groups from around Mombasa to enhance their livelihoods through capacity building in terms of environmental and entrepreneurial activities and socio-economic community development.
The challenges and problems the Kenyan youth faces are obviously shown. Transition from school, college or university into working life isn't fluent. Instead it's very tough for young people to gain financial independence by finding regular employment. Most notably affected by underemployment and the feeling of being marginalized by political and economical elites, the idle youth is more vulnerable to criminality and drug abuse.
However, these Youth Groups, amalgamations of youths who are keen to earn their livelihood legally, try to explore new ideas and ways of generating income. These resulting businesses vary from offering services like carwash or industrial cleaning, to agriculture/farming activities, as well as artistry and selling all kinds of self-made products.
This Eco-Ethics-Project "MAC" supports the youth groups in building their own professional & efficient organizational structures, identifying new markets and satisfying them sustainable with high-quality products.
Especially the aspect of getting into new markets is a much needed step for the artists, since their only possibility of distribution is by selling it on the street. With a demanding market and sustainable income, as they say, they'll be able to concentrate more on the production itself, instead of the selling. That means the quality is likely to get higher, while other new ideas would raise their innovativeness.
And second, which is almost more important, the youths would be able to also switch from a day to day life (survival) to a forward-thinking consciousness. That means issues like heath care, further education or just the economizing of their income could be embraced.
Except for that, an improved order situation indirectly benefits the communities, as many of these Groups take great care of their local environment through clean-ups or biological conservation, as well as other charitable activities like advocacy and even an eco-tourism-project is offered.
This variety of enterprises leads to a consolidation and stabilization of the Youth Groups as Community-Based-Organizations (CBO) and in turn opens the door for more local employment and the hope for ecological and economical uplift within the community.
MAC implies environmental friendly production, initiated by youth-led dedication, with a sustainable impact on the local community!
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- Man-made jewellery-art
- Baskets & bags
- Pictures (and frames)
- Home wares (Brushes, mats)
- Clothing (Shirts, caps, belts, scarves)
If you have any special wishes of design, feel free to ask-most of the products can be individually customized!
An important issue for the producers is that through recycling methods and the usage of all natural regrowing resources (banana-fibres/palm-raffia) the production costs are low while there's no additional waste and therefore the environment is kept clean.
A good example for this practice is the so-called Tire-Shoe:Usually the artisans are burning old tyres, trying to extract valuable metals, which they can sell at a cheap cost to scrap metal dealers. Unfortunately this procedure is releasing a lot of toxic fumes into air. Not only are they intensifying the green house effect, but also causing harmful diseases, especially to manufacturers.
The alternative:
Eco Ethics is encouraging the production of Tyre-Shoes. That means, instead of burning, the artisans cut them into the shape of a sandal, and then prepare them with different methods of beautification.
These shoes enjoy great popularity allover Kenya.
For more information visit our facebook page! or email: msa.artists @ gmail.com