In our location near Arusha, the tourism capital of East Africa, we are working to establish a hub for creating job opportunities for people with disabilities. We want to come alongside disabled producers, trainees and entrepreneurs and help them source the right tools and materials, expand their product ranges, connect with more customers and run their businesses more efficiently and sustainably.

Building on our 12 years working with people with disabilities at Neema Crafts in Iringa, we are planning to have various workshop areas where disabled people can explore and develop a variety of new skills, a shop selling crafts produced by people with disabilities from across Tanzania (including Neema Crafts products), as well as a cafe where we employ deaf staff, and use this as a community church space on Sundays.

We have set up an international NGO called See Ability First International or SAFI (safi is Swahili for cool or clean), to support Neema Crafts with design and marketing across the region and to partner with other existing projects. We are already working in partnership with a couple of other organisations and have a number of possible trainees in the pipeline.

We plan to train groups of people, coach them in business and product development and send them out to run their businesses independently. The idea is for SAFI to provide ongoing support through buying products from these producer groups and finding markets across Tanzania and beyond.