Pencils for Plastics Lake Victoria, Kenya, Africa

Dan Fritschen is organizing this fundraiser.

Donation protected

THANK YOU for your generosity. We achieved our first goal and are now collecting 1,000 pounds of plastic trash per event at the original location - south of Mbita. A new effort has started near Kisumu. We will be collecting there as well and need an additional $3,000 for equipment, wages, and pencils for the students!

We are Dan & Barbara Fritschen, and we traveled from California to Kenya to help rural and urban communities tackle problems identified by these communities.

Along the shores of beautiful Lake Victoria is a remote village called Nyagwethe. Nyagwethe has a supply of plastic wrappers and bottles arriving weekly, but no way to dispose of this garbage besides burying or burning it.

Isaac Tito and Julius Otieno Otewa are two Nyagwethe residents who are keen on improving their community and environment. We worked with Isaac and Julius to develop a program that educates the village children on how to remove plastics and other trash from the environment so it can then be recycled.

We are raising funds to buy recycling equipment for this community, so they may create a culture of enviromentally-friendly practices in the disposal/recycling of garbage.

The Details:

The trash problem:

Most Kenyan rural communities, including Nyagwethe, have no trash collection services. The nearest proper trash disposal site is over 60 miles away, accessible only by a dirt road.
Garbage is left anywhere and everywhere and is often burned, releasing toxic fumes. Much of the trash ends up littering the beach and the waters of Lake Victoria.
Nyagwethe does not have a culture of disposing garbage in a way that positively impacts the environment.

To foster a culture of reusing and recycling trash, children will:

Collect and bring trash to recycling center in exchange for school supplies
Participate in regular environmental protection classes delivered by teachers

To recycle trash, local workers will:

Shred and combine plastics with cement and sand to create bricks. As much as 30% of these bricks by volume will be waste plastic. Bricks will be sold to recoup material costs.
Shred and compost paper and organic material.
Take glass and metals 1-2 times per year to a recycling center 200 miles away.
Clean cloth and reuse for mops or for reuseable sanitary pads, depending on type and condition of cloth.

Your funds will go towards purchasing a plastics shredder ($1200), a brick mold ($100), fence to contain materials ($100), and employee training ($100). Additionally, $500 will go towards annual operating expenses of the recycling center/school supply exchange program.

Thank you for your support!

Dan, Barbara, and the Nyagwethe Community