SHAPE International

Providing for Children

In 2011, we jump started a program that is bringing joy to children in one of the poorest areas of Burundi, Africa. Imagine waking up hungry, not knowing when your next meal will be and missing school because your parents can't afford books. That is exactly how many children in Burundi live.

We are bringing hope to these children by purchasing their uniforms, shoes, backpacks, books, and schools supplies. Each child in our program receives a nutritious lunch after school. The meals are cooked by local women and food is purchased from local farmers in Rugombo.

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Helping Farmers

Subsistence farmers barely earn enough income to feed their families one meal a day. In 2009, we started a pilot program for farmers in Burundi to teach them how to increase their income by farming more valuable crops. The first crop we planted was jatropha curcas. The jatropha curcas tree produces seeds that are valuable for their high yielding oil content.

This year we are expanding the pilot program to a larger plot of land that will support more farmers. The land was donated to SHAPE by the provincial governor that oversees the community where SHAPE is operating.

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Plant Oil Production

Pedal Powered Jatropha Sheller/Oil Extractor

Plant oils are a versatile product, providing the raw material to make biodiesel, lamp oil, and soap. There are even stoves that will burn plant oils. As our plant oil farm expands, we are developing inexpensive ways to process the oil to provide an income source for the communities where the oil seeds are growing.

A friend of SHAPE, Amilio Aviles, helped one of our partners develop a pedal powered machine to shell and crush oil seeds. We believe pedal powered machines could transform poor communities by providing a low cost, efficient means of processing oil seeds.

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Clean Cookstoves

Providing a Clean Burning Solution

Imagine a kitchen appliance so deadly that it wiped out the entire population of West Virginia in a single year. That is exactly the situation in developing countries where 2 million people die annually from respiratory illnesses caused by smoke inhalation from unclean cookstoves. Charcoal cookstoves let off hazardous smoke and leave countries devastated from the destruction of trees to make the charcoal.

As a member of the Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves, SHAPE is helping reverse the problems caused by charcoal stoves. In 2011, we conducted a field test with the Protos plant oil stove manufactured by Bosch and Siemens Home Appliances. We are researching other types of stoves, including a briquette cookstove. We plan to introduce clean cookstoves in Burundi and Haiti when our field tests are successfully completed.

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Soap Production

Helping to Boost the Local Economy

We take soap for granted, but in developing countries it can literally be a life saver. Cholera is a deadly disease caused by poor sanitation and unclean water. It spreads when people do not wash their hands after using the bathroom and before handling food.

In June 2011, SHAPE teamed with a Burundi NGO to teach women how to make soap from plant oils. Not only is the soap a life saver, but it is providing an income for these women and their families.

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A Clean Water Solution

Clean Water with an Electrolysis Water Unit

In the time it takes you to read this paragraph, a child will die from a water related disease. Surprisingly, 1 out of 8 people in the world still do not have access to clean water. We can bring hope to these people through a relatively simple invention – a portable electrolysis water purification system.

We are fielding an electrolysis water system developed by the Hays PureWater for all Foundation. Each unit purifies enough water for a village of over 1000 people. Similar in concept to a salt water pool chlorinator, the Hays PureWater system produces chlorine from salt water. The chlorine makes contaminated water safe to drink.

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