GreenAble: A Model of Socially Responsible Entrepreneurship

We have visited several QASA projects during our stay in South Africa, particularly self-help centres and digital villages. Yesterday, we spent the day at Green Office, a QASA partner and office supply company that focuses on managing office paper use in an environmentally friendly manner.We toured the facility and met the director of GreenAble, a cartridge collection entrepreneurship program that employs people with disabilities.

GreenAble hires people with disabilities as "agents," who collect ink catridges throughout the country. Green Office reuses many of these cartridges, while recycling those that are not reuseable. The company hires additional people with disabilities to disassemble used cartridges to ensure that the remnants are recyclable. Following our tour, we interviewed several employees.

We were both intrigued by the sustainability and potential of the GreenAble project. Not only will it create jobs for people with disabilities(women, in particular), but they (QASA and Green Office) have developed a model that could possibly work effectively in various companies throughout Africa.

A Look at South African Bureaucracy...

Last week, we traveled to Pretoria, the political capital of South Africa, with Lubabalo and Lungelo from the National Council of People with Physical Disabilities of South Africa (NCPPDSA) to attend a meeting with Estelle Crawford of the South African Department of Labour. The relationship between the NCPPDSA and the Department of Labour focuses on decreasing the unemployment rate of people with disabilities. As stated, 99% of people with disabilities are unemployed, which makes them one of the most under-represented groups in the South African labour market. The Department of Labour has been subsidizing the salaries of several NCPPDSA employees, who work as career counselors by connecting people with disabilities with job opportunities throughout the country.

Officials from the Department of Labour criticized the contract with the NCPPDSA due to:

1) Its cost to the government
2) Its sustainability, or lack thereof.

The meeting was a means to discuss the relationship and to stress the need for the state’s continued support. At the end of the meeting, the Department of Labour agreed to continue subsidizing the salaries of the NCPPDSA workers. It is important to get South Africans employed, particularly those who have a disability. By getting people with disabilities into jobs, South Africa can move closer to living its legislated equality.

Resumania

We have spent the past week at the NCPPDSA. To further our understanding of employment disability issues unique to South Africa, we dedicated our first day to revieweing relevant legislation including:

• The Employment Equity Act: The employment equity act states the employers must employ a certain percentage of people with disabilities.
• The South African Bill of Rights: The South African Bill of Rights specifically states that unfair discrimination may not take place "on grounds of disability."
• The Promotion of Equality and Prevention of Unfair Discrimination Act : The Promotion of Equality and Prevention of Unfair Discrimination Act essentially states that discrimination may be unfair when one is treated differently by a person or group; but, that fair discrimination exists if people are treated differently because they have been previously disadvantaged in some way.

In spite of the aforementioned legislation, about 99% of people with disabilties in South Africa are unemployed. A primary objective of the NCPPDSA is to connect people with disabilities to suitable employment opportunities. NCPPDSA facilitates these connections through a resume database. We noticed that the majority of the resumes were very difficult to categorize and arrange becuase they were long and written according to few conventions.

In order to potentially expedite and improve the employment process, we created a comprehensive resume guide. Our guide incorporates conventions from most professional resumes in the United States (one page, clear, and concise), while also considering the South African context (incorporating national ID numbers and information regarding language spoken and ethnic background).

The intention of the guide is to provide people with disabilities a resource for resume creation that will result in resumes that more clearly reflect their career accomplishments. Consequently, the guide will hopefully improve the database and result in increased relationships between employers and people with disabilities.

Greetings from Jo-Burg

Today, we arrived in South Africa after a long journey. Employees of the QuadPara Association of South Africa (QASA) greeted us with great warmth, kindness, and boerewors (South African sausage). We enjoyed our first night in Johannesburg with a braai (Afrikaans for barbeque). Over the next six weeks, we will work with the National Council for Persons with Physical Disabilities in South Africa (NCPPDSA) and QASA to facilitate job preparation workshops and sensitization seminars for employers and private recruitment agencies in an effort to increase employment opportunities for people with disabilities in South Africa.


Before we begin our orientation tomorrow morning, we wanted to take the time to introduce ourselves:


Chris Adams: I am a rising senior Psychology & Philosophy double major. My interest in people with disabilities began when I volunteered to cycle across the United States to spread awareness and raise funds for people with disabilities. It is through this experience that I became interested in the topics of community and sexual psychology within the disability community. This experience will open my eyes to the research needed on the lives and needs of people with disabilities around the world.


Kit Dobyns: I am a rising senior Africana studies major. During my previous experiences working in Tanzania and Rwanda, I have had the opportunity to witness the unique challenges people with disabilities face in sub-Saharan Africa. Through my endeavors with NCPPDSA and QASA, I hope to learn from and contribute to their progressive approach to supporting persons with disabilities in sub-Saharan Africa.

Thanks for taking the time to read our blog. We will do our best to update the site frequently.



Chris and Kit

Adios Durban!

Our first week in Durban is over and we’re packing up to head over to the Western Cape, where we will spend a week working and living at the QASA facilities. We’ve learned a lot while in Durban and working at the KZN Ashley Digital Village. The Digital Village is a computer-learning center where quadra- and parapalegics are given computer literacy training. At the Village we examined and suggested improvements for the current training materials and led two skill-building workshops on ‘active listening’ and ‘root-cause analysis’. We spent a lot of time sensitizing ourselves and orienting our viewpoints to understand a new way of living, not only understanding a new culture but also in learning particularly how people with disabilities live in South Africa. We were able see first-hand how QASA empowers its members with the tools necessary to gain employment. Not only are they training disabled persons to re-enter the workforce but the on-site trainers also live with a disability. Again we are noticing a pattern of self-sufficiently. Here QASA exhibits a pattern of training and employing its own people so that they in turn are influencing other disabled persons to live a full life.

Free Our Innocent

On our last full day in Durban, we visited QASA's innovative "Free Our Innocent" project. Through a partnership between QASA and the Department of Correctional Services, prisoners were brought into the Chesterville township to build wheelchair ramps for quadra- and parapalegic community members whose homes were previously inaccessible. Guided by a member of the QASA board, Vusi, we visited several project sites and chatted with beneficiaries of the program. We spoke with both young and elderly quadra- and parapalegics whose lives were improved through increased mobility. Many of the ramps spiraled up steep hillsides which previously created enormous barriers to transportation, as quads and paras had to be carried up and down the hills whenever they wanted to leave their homes. One man we spoke with described several drastic lifestyle changes which accompanied the building of a ramp outside his home, including the abilities to create a small business and to have friends in wheelchairs visit him.

Learn more about the project by clicking here.

Safari Adventure

Our first weekend in South Africa might just be the best weekend that both of us have ever had. It was a two day safari escapade that we will both remember! The Hluhluwe-Umfolozi Game Reserve, located three hours north of Durban, is the oldest game reserve in South Africa and is well-known for containing the Big Five game: lions, elephants, buffalo, leopards, and rhinoceros. Through the expertise of our seasoned guide and new friend, Prakash, we were fortunate enough find most of the Big Five as well as many other animals such as giraffes, zebras, baboons, warthogs, impalas, and nyalas. The highlight of our tour was witnessing (from a safe distance) a territorial stand-off between a herd of thirty elephants and an enormous white rhinoceros. The last segment of our adventure was a sunset boatride on the beautiful St. Lucia Estuary. After Sarah flightendly panicked at the thought of jumping over the dock and into the boat (terrified at the thought of falling into a hippo & croc infested waterway), we all boarded the boat and floated into the beautiful wetlands. During our ride, we spotted several large herds of hippopotami, a number of exotic birds, and enormous crocodile--one of which almost snapped at Eva as she unsuspectingly focused her camera into the vicious creature's eye from the edge of the boat. It didn't take long before she realized that it was wild and alive! The trip was a wonderful cultural compliment to our internship, and an unforgettable experience for us both!