In this essay (3 parts)
Published anonymously with the author’s permission. A detail that could identify the author has been removed.
Introduction
Sustainable community development is a very important aspect necessary for human development initiatives that create impact, especially for under-resourced and culturally inclined communities in Africa, and Kenya in particular. The community aspect enhances the outcomes by ensuring a collective rather than individualistic approach that ensures a collaborative and participatory process for groups of people connected by a shared way of life, history or ancestry. In Kenya, many programs implemented within communities are prescribed by the implementing partner to suit their organizational objectives without seeking the opinions of the participating community members. This approach denies the participating community an opportunity to share their local knowledge and lived experiences that can help meet the present needs while ensuring continuity for future generations.
Youth empowerment through social media technology and sports
This is an initiative that I took charge of in the year 2023. I had previously undergone a training in basic computer packages and a government training in digital skills for employment, which gave me the motivation to give back to society and share my knowledge with fellow youth in rural communities. The initiative involved empowering teams of youth from my rural community who were running various projects such as agribusiness, charcoal burning and vegetable vending, but had no idea how to use technology and social media to market their products. We included a community outreach programme to treat jigger-infested members of the community living in abject poverty. Members gave small contributions, purchasing drugs and facilitating personnel to help us in the exercise.
Through collaboration and social inclusion, we were able to take collective action and managed to solve a problem together.
This was a community because the members were willingly participating and everyone’s opinion mattered. I shared my vision with the other youth and asked for their ideas on how we could best proceed in order to succeed as a team. Through collaboration and social inclusion, we were able to take collective action and managed to solve a problem together.
The project focused on empowering the youth to be able to market their products through social media channels. The goal was to build income opportunities, life skills and engagement among the youth and the larger community through sports. Participants acquired knowledge and skills on the role of technology in business. A mobile phone was used on a short-term basis, while a long-term plan for impact was envisioned through the formation of a Community Based Organization (CBO) with a website.
Successful sustainable development means that our needs were met when the youth sold products as earlier planned. A simple monitoring and evaluation tool for tracking progress and early detection of failure was developed. Success was achieved when potential customers learned about the existence and whereabouts of the products, and placed more orders. There was a resulting balance of environmental, social and economic needs which created hope for the future. There was a measure of failure because most participants did not have digital phones, which delayed customer orders, while the sports aspect did not take off because of resources.
The main tools used then were Facebook and WhatsApp. Currently we are also using a mobile farming app for weather forecasts.
There were power dynamics that impacted the outcomes positively. Before starting the implementation, we reached out to the local leadership (the chief’s office) to help mobilize the youth groups through the local administrative leadership. This approach gave the initiative a great boost because the community members supported our activities due to the influence of the leaders.
The tools, methods and approaches used could have been more advanced, with far-reaching impact, if the youth had access to sufficient resources and modern gadgets like smartphones and laptops. Due to lack of resources to pay expert trainers, the quality of training was not as high as required on technology and digital skills, apart from whatever knowledge I had to share with the youth at the time. In addition, YouTube and TikTok had not yet gained popularity in the rural areas compared to the current situation, which could have created better and faster impact on the marketing of the farm products.
Planning for sustainability
There was a plan to ensure sustainability. We planned a table banking initiative where the youth were to pay a minimum of 1 share (KES 100) monthly, and a social welfare amount of KES 20 monthly. The share amount was to serve as security for members to borrow small amounts of money for emergencies like fertilizer and pesticides for their crops. The KES 20 was to build a social fund for each member, aimed at bringing a collective approach when faced with challenges like sickness and death, as well as weddings, graduations and childbirth, some of which come without warning and can be a great source of embarrassment and stress.
There was also a plan to establish a resource center for youth, where more affordable or free empowerment sessions on production and marketing of their products would be conducted for greater impact in the community. The sessions were aimed at helping the youth to transition from conventional methods of producing raw materials to a focus on value addition, since it brings better income. Members also agreed to move our focus from staple foods like maize and beans, which take long with less returns, to short-term crops like vegetables and legumes, which are even required by hospitals and learning institutions.
The initiative managed to achieve the table banking and social welfare initiative, the change from long-term to short-term crops, and marketing through Facebook and WhatsApp. If we had managed to establish a CBO and set up a website, we would have initiated a better and far-reaching project that would have exposed the products of the youth to a bigger market and better returns, ensuring a vibrant community with socially and economically empowered youth who are able to move the community to another level of development.