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KENYA
Tech Europe Partners with 'Actions Not Words'
As part of the company's corporate donation strategy, Tech Europe (EMEA) is sponsoring the medical care of a young boy, Ibrahim, who suffers with cerebral palsy and lives on a garbage dump in Kenya. The donation is administered by 'Actions Not Words', Tech Europe's chosen international charity partner, an NGO which works to better the lives of children living in squalor in Kenya through education and medical support. Currently 'Actions Not Words', founded in 2012, focuses on an area within Nakuru, Kenya and sponsors over 60 children into boarding school from one of Kenya's most poverty stricken slums. Ibrahim lives on Gioto garbage slum, the local garbage dump on the outskirts of Nakuru that over 140 families call home. This includes over 300 children, many of whom are orphans. Despite living in these unfathomable conditions, the people of Gioto are a true testament to the resiliency and adaptability of the human spirit. People search the garbage for food and collect anything that can be recycled or sold for a small profit. However, despite their resourcefulness, every day is a battle for survival. People live in inadequate housing and struggle to find enough food and water.
Education and healthcare are practically inaccessible, leading to epidemic levels of unemployment and disease.
Tech Europe has identified strongly with the two main priorities of 'Actions Not Words', to enable the next generation through education and to provide medical care, as well as medicine, to slum residents of all ages.
Managing Director of Tech Europe, Gary Crawford, outlines the reasoning behind partnering with 'Actions Not Words': "Tech Europe (EMEA), the business, is currently engaged in developing sales on the African continent as part of a geographic expansion plan, however Tech Europe (EMEA), the people, felt that it was vital to give something back in some tangible, practical form. Once we heard about 'Actions Not Words' and the work they were doing in Kenya, a region where Tech is active, and once we understood the aims of the organisation, we felt that there was situation we could not ignore and the perfect project to engage with in line with our corporate donation strategy. There are undoubtedly many great needs in Gioto garbage slum, and much work to do, and we felt that providing practical medical
support to Ibrahim was a real way of making a difference to one important life. Tech is proud of the values on which the company was built and on which it still operates today and a key part of this ethic is to look out and give back, and we are delighted to be doing that with 'Actions Not Words'."
(Picture, from left to right: Gary Crawford (Managing Director, Tech Europe (EMEA), Glenn Floyd (Charity Director, 'Actions Not Words'), Lyndsay Kitchen (Charity Director, 'Actions Not Words'), Roberta Truesdale (Management Accountant, Tech Europe (EMEA))
For more information on 'Actions Not Words', please visit http://www.actionsnotwordskenya.co m.
Details of an initiative to build a school for slum kids in Kenya can also be found via the Facebook page, https://www.facebook.com/ActionsN otWordsKenya.