We’ve talked a lot about the various ways that volunteers make our charity successful. The next few Friday briefings will highlight some local efforts and perhaps light a spark in your mind about a way you can help with our work. We have people from all walks of life helping us doing things like accounting, IT, and even construction. Our aim is to efficiently pack the container as full as we can and if you own more than a couple of tools you’ll know they are an unruly mass of strange shapes and sizes which make compact storage a challenge. This is where the crates come in.

For many years now we’ve been getting shipping crates from Andy Pyne. Lots of them. We love them for many reasons, and we’ll list all of them below, but mostly because it helps us fill the container so much more efficiently. We like them so much that we are now helping to support Andy in the purchase of materials. Like so many organisations these days, and after many years of support, the church group, ‘Timeout’ find they are struggling to fully support the cost of the materials for his project . We had to choose to do without or do the right thing. The right thing was done and we are now working with Andy, along with ‘Timeout’, to ensure our supply of these magic boxes doesn’t disappear.

These are far more than shipping crates. Our charity has always believed that volunteer work provides training, social contact, it fights loneliness and feelings of isolation and it can be quite fun. Andy’s crates are fabricated by volunteers who learn useful woodworking skills and have some fun doing it . Once they are made up we fill them with tools and load them into our container. When they arrive at our workshop in Mwanza they are emptied and the tools stored (or refurbished) and then the boxes are refilled with specialist tool sets, carpentry, mechanics, etc. The tools are then easily transported to the rural end users who will use them as secure and organised storage for their new tools.  That makes five times these boxes are put to use. That’s a lot of value. You can see why we like them.

Andy is currently interested in finding someone who wants to work with him to learn the whole process, to act as a mentor to new volunteers and also be a backup when needed and of course there is always the opportunity to volunteer if you want to learn how to build these, no experience necessary.

The crates cost approximately £20 to manufacture. If you’d like to support this great cause click here to donate or here to contact us about volunteering.