Trash Farms: Mtaa Safi Initiative finds creative ways to reuse trash

Over 2.5 million live in Kibera, well over 15 villages and enough people to start their own small country. 

However, waste management is a nightmare, collection and disposable a tragedy and hygiene almost non-existent.

Ever heard of flying toilets? Well, you may be walking about your day, minding your own business when a small jualaa lands at your feet, on your clothes, in your fa… you get the idea.

Inside the unexpected delivery would be a generous portion of human waste.

I apologise for ruining your appetite, but is the reality, or at least it was.

Three young men saw the depraved state of the shanty town and took it upon themselves to restore dignity to Kibera under one umbrella, The Mtaa Safi Initative.

Today’s champions of change tell the story of a new life being provided to nearly three million people with their solutions in waste collection and management, sanitation projects and community action.

Mtaa Safi is founded by Denis Juma or as his pals would could him, Ospina. He was born and brought up in Kibera seeing the state of life affect the health and mindset of his peers, parents and children in his neighbourhood.

So, he teamed up with Sylvester Ochieng, Tilen Stephens Owino and a few other young men to correct this wrong on humanity.

They have cleared up about 30 holding sited for trash within Kibera and made use of the corridor spaces in an unconventional way. What was once a heap of trash, they transform into a smalll greenhouse garden that can produce vegetables and greens for up to 15 households.

They engaged with community members to show them what cleaned holding sites would look like, and in turn the community decides what would be grown there.

“For us it is more of local solutions to local problems, so, we were moving away from food security to food sovereignty, where people pick what they consume, unlike food security where you have the food that can be provided.”

A community project in Kenya, truth be told, is usually only seen as such when there is financial gain of some sort; job opportunity etc.

With the idea of improving people’s livelihood, Mtaa Safi has over 200 employees and an endless register of casual workers that provide the labour to make this possible.

The collection process

They distribute 2 sets of trash bags to over 1200 households in the area; organic waste bags and no-organic waste bags. It is collected at the end of the week and put in informal holding spaces for sorting.

A bag of trash can weigh up to 7kgs for a family home. After weighing the bags, they begin separating the contents into organic waste, plastic waste, electronic waste, textile waste and paper waste. It is all weighed again in their categories.

Plastic waste is shredded between HDPE(hard plastic) and PET(bottle) and sold for value addition, the electonic waste is sent to WeCentre, metals are sent to scrap companies and organic waste is broken down by black soldier flies to create compost.

The compost is used in the little farms distributed across the revamped holding sites to nourish the greens in planting.

More than trash

However, it’s not just about planting veggies and picking up trash. These young men care for the heart of the society so they also build community sanitation spots; a set of genderised bathrooms and washrooms and a clean water point.

“The main reason was to redirect the sewer system from the rivers and to provide this much needed service to the community and restore the dignity.” 

The washrooms on the female side also contain sanitary towel bins teaching young girls and women healthy ways of pad and tampon disposal

Mtaa Safi embodies what “charity begins at home”, means; cleaning up the slum space one trash site at a time and bringing the whole community with them for it.