Austrian company HAAS is supporting a bakery apprentice workshop to help children in Korogocho, emphasising the company’s motto ‘Because Education Matters’.
HAAS Marketing Communication and Public Relations Manager Irene Kapaun recently visited Nairobi to report on the project’s progress.
In Korogocho, the streets are choked with garbage and there is no sewage system. During periods of rainfall, the entire area is flooded and wastewater flows through the provisional barracks. Water is expensive, scarce, and frequently polluted.
Irene Kapaun explained: "We want to help create a future worth living for Korogocho’s children".
Active measures against child malnutrition include the establishment of an integrated training bakery at a local school. HAAS supports the bread and education for a better future project, which ensures children are not only offered a nutritious meal every day, but also an education enabling them to provide for themselves as adults.
Within the project, 98 children in primary schools are cared for. In addition to one hot meal every day, children are provided with fresh fruit and basic medical care.
The project’s team helps children regain a normal life with structured daily routines. A special rehabilitation program helps drug addicted children and the school offers psycho-social support, being a sort of home and a secure space.
Irene added: "The measures have changed their lives dramatically: They have found their self-esteem, they have new hope for the future."
Once the children finish school, they can enrol in apprenticeship courses to become bakers. A European master baker trains the young students in collaboration with African bakers.
Irene points out: "In these two-year courses students learn the basic skills of the bakery trade and after graduation, they are well equipped to find employment or to open their own businesses. Well trained professionals are still hard to find in Nairobi.
"A lack of education results in a lack of self-confidence and courage. Adults who are well-trained and educated will become self-sufficient and able to lead independent lives. With the financial support of bread and education for a better future, we are helping to give the children in the slums of Nairobi an education and an opportunity to learn a promising profession."
Haas is providing support to the bakery until the end of 2016.
Irene said: "We are very happy that the bakery will be able to finance itself until the end of the year. Congratulations to our project partners!
"Education is still close to our hearts and therefore we will continue our engagement in the future."
