BIOGAS PROJECT: ENKARE NAIROWUA PRIMARY SCHOOL, MAJIMOTO

Majimoto is a remote, rural community with mostly Masai inhabitants. It is located 170km east of Nairobi, situated between the Maasai Mara National Reserve to the south and the Mau Forest to the north. The Mau Forest is East Africa’s largest forest, but during the past 15 years more than 100,000 hectares have been settled and cleared due to population growth and agricultural pressures. The Kenyan government faces an enormous challenge to cut deforestation and reforest the land. Tearing out the trees at the heart of Kenya has triggered a cascade of drought and despair in the surrounding valleys. The rivers that flow from the forest are drying up. And as they disappear, so too have Kenya’s harvests, its cattle farms, its hydro-electricity, its lakes and even its famous wildlife parks. The forest is not only crucial to Kenya’s tea industry, agriculture and ecosystem, but its rivers feed Tanzania’s Serengeti and keep the fisherman of Lake Victoria afloat. And when you consider that Lake Victoria is the source of the Nile, you begin to grasp the scale of the crisis this area is facing. 

 

Dig Deep (www.digdeep.org.uk, reg. charity number 1121493) seeks to provide sustainable solutions to the problems faced by rural communities in Kenya. In tandem with Dig Deep we will construct a fixed dome biogas digester at Enkare Nairowua Primary School in Majimoto. The school has 169 pre-school students, 474 primary students and 13 staff. Renewable sources of energy are vital in protecting Kenya’s forest resource. Organic matter is fed into the biogas digester and in the process, bacteria decomposes this matter in the absence of oxygen producing biogas. The biogas produced is combustible and can be used as fuel. The school burns a considerable amount of firewood in order to cook food for the students and staff. Our biogas project will provide the school with cooking gas, reducing the dependence on the forest resource by producing clean and renewable energy. The anaerobic digestion inactivates pathogens and parasites, and is therefore very effective in reducing the incidence of water borne diseases.

 

The biogas project will offer an environmentally friendly way to dispose of waste, while the by-product of the process, a slurry, is a very effective fertilizer. With the money saved on fuel wood we will construct a kitchen garden at the school, this will provide locally sourced food and help cut the need to clear forest land for agricultural use.

 

Increasing population growth in the drier areas of Kenya has lead to pressure which exceeds the carrying capacity of the land, producing lower income per capita and even famine. Wild animals have been uprooted from their natural environments while the soils fertility is declining. These grave conservation and climate issues need immediate attention as a large percentage of Kenya’s population depend on natural resources for survival. If we fail to protect Kenya’s natural resources we could witness an ecological and humanitarian disaster on an unprecedented scale. We seek to raise £8000 and with no staff costs or overheads at Dig Deep, 100% of your donation, no matter how big or small, goes directly to the project in Kenya.

 

Many thanks, Nicholas Harris and Thomas Ketchell

 

Please note: To increase the value of your donation by 28% to the project, please opt for Gift Aid. Dig Deep can reclaim basic rate tax from the inland revenue on your donation, increasing its amount at no extra cost to you.

 

To keep up to date on our fundraising activities and for more information on the biogas project please go to: http://majimotobiogas.tumblr.com/