What We Do
B2A Community Development
The Maskini Community in Mwanza, Tanzania
We are committed to helping the poor and disabled (Maskini) community in Mwanza. These people, many of whom suffer with leprosy, live either on the streets or in Bukumbi Care Centre.
We are working with them to meet their basic needs - things which, in the Western world, we may simply take for granted:
Access to clean water
A nutritionally balanced diet
Hygienic toilets and showers
Somewhere secure to store any personal effects
Access to medical and dental treatment
A gathering place
Any means to generate an income of their own.
Our ongoing programme has already gone a long way to meet these needs, restoring dignity and raising self-esteem along the way.
Bukumbi Care Centre
Our Community Development programme is centred around Bukumbi Care Centre (BCC). We are committed to a long-term plan of improvements at Bukumbi, involving input from the community itself and utilising volunteers to carry out refurbishments. So far, we have achieved the following:
We provide on-going access to medical and dental treatment for the residents. 
We have refurbished the toilet blocks and five of the six dormitories, the community building and more renovations planned for 2011.
We have raised £14,500 to fund a new water system for the centre, partly from direct donations and partly from our own general funds. Much of this has now been used on improving the internal systems in the accommodation blocks, and the remainder will be spent to complete the system, hopefully by autumn 2010.
In January 2009 we employed Kibibi Kengia as a Community Development Worker, and she has set up an income generation scheme for residents to make and sell their crafts for a small profit.
Our education programme started in 2007 and aims to support the children from families with leprosy and disability to attend school and support them in their learning. We also have a small student sponoship programme.
We record our work at Bukumbi in a monthly diary - click here to read it.
Hope for the future, and how you can help
Our long-term goal is to empower the Maskini community and give them the chance of a better life. With your help, we can make this a reality.
Would you like to visit Bukumbi and make a hands-on difference to the lives of the people there? Please email Ruth Bowyer, our Visits Administrator, for details.
You can always donate money to Bridge2Aid – even £5 would allow us to buy a new cleaning kit for residents of a dormitory at Bukumbi. Or why not take part in one of our fundraising challenges?