eThekwini Community Foundation – a development programme
The recently invigorated eThekwini Community Foundation (eCF) is a proactive, results-driven, forward-thinking, not-for-profit public benefit organisation established by eThekwini Municipality whose mission is interfacing people – projects – planet.
The brief of eThekwini Community Foundation is to act as a conduit and strategist between NPOs; independent initiatives; the business community; service providers; the city; the public; the province and the market-place to support, develop and create sustainable projects.
Those projects which have a strong environmental ethos, or which support recycling and up-cycling are favoured, as are projects which work within the creative industries and which provide employment, or income streams, for fledgling, marginalised entrepreneurs and NPOs.
The eThekwini Community Foundation is strategically aligned to, fully embedded within and supported by eThekwini Municipality. The eCF is housed within the municipal department of International and Governance Relations, so is strategically well-poised to work at the interface between Municipal and Provincial mandates, as well as at an international level, particularly through the city’s Sister Cities network.
The eCF has been operational for a while, but has been given a new lease on life under the direction of Kathryn Kure who works closely with International and Governace Relations’ Eric Apelgren and his team.
“Strategically, the eCF is at the heart of strategy and networking. It is mandated to leverage resources to enable community development. It is envisioned that projects incubated within the eCF will be able to go to scale, and those that do not we will be able to learn from and enable success long-term. It shall be an honest broker in terms of interacting with the non-profit community, municipality and business entities,” explains Kathryn Kure: Director of the eCF.
“Durban is like the ‘middle child’ in a family; it does not have the size of Johannesburg or the perceived ‘x’ factor of Cape Town. All too often, sadly, it is overlooked, which is not just a problem of image; it’s a problem for our economy,” bemoans Kure. eCF aims to harness the national and international interest in Durban created by the FIFA World Cup Soccer, Cop17 and Top Gear: “It would be smart to leverage this awareness and build upon it,” she enthuses.
“Our story is not merely that we are caring but also smart and therefore sustainable. Apart from anything else, we also have to breathe new life into our Arts and Culture Precinct, but that is as much about creating products as it is about re-imagining spaces, as much about marketing and tourism as it is about design.”
Kure and her team have made huge strides into living their mission, and have fast-tracked their networking mandate. eCF is currently working on an impressive array of astonishing initiatives. She has identified key stakeholders and is working on initiating partnerships with large, medium and small businesses, non-profits, crafters, advertisers and waste management throughout the Municipality.
Already she is harnessed the creative energies of Umcebo Design; uKhamba and Ubunye Crafters; Refugee Social Services; Room 13 (the foundation supported world-wide by TBWA); Afripack; Vega; DUT; Wildlands Conservation Trust; Crushed Lemon (who reuse advertising bill-board material and make them into products) and independent emerging designers. The eCF is being guided and supported by internationally-respected strategists including Dr Thomas Oosthuizen: international brand specialist and Dr Andrew Venter: CEO, Wildlands Conservation Trust.
The projects being facilitated by eCF are many and various. Among the initiatives currently being rolled out are:
Job Opportunity Centre:
The eCF is to be added to an MOU relating to a large-scale project which has been incubated within the iTrump area-based management model for the City of Durban. The project includes generating an extensive Joblinx database to match corporate / civic need with available personnel. Job seekers will be invited to register their skills and details in to the database, which can be accessed by employers. The intention is for this project to be housed in an easily–accessible city building. Currently the project is being partnered by The Development House and includes many units within the eThekwini Municipality including Skills Development and Business Support, Tourism and Markets as well as Mr Price.
Craft Sector Liaison:
Craft practitioners should be working towards sustainable income-generation and profit making ventures. eCF supports the arts and craft sector – celebrating those that are operating in a financially sustainable manner, and exploring what it takes for others to become commercially viable. eCF is working closely with Deven Reddy from the Innovation Incubation Centre at DUT; the Business Support Tourism and Markets Unit of the municipality and various partners within the marketing and advertising industries, including Vega and TBWA.
A host of crafters and craft facilitators are involved: Robin Opperman and Jackie Sewpersad of Umcebo Design are working on various projects with a myriad crafters, supported by waste material from Afripack. Crafters include those from Refugee Social Services; Ubunye Crafters and uKhamba Crafters; Debbie Eustice and her team at HIV911 at UKZN are working with Ubunye Crafters; Wendy Chatterton has been working with uKhamba Crafters from Hammarsdale for many years; TBWA / Room 13 is working with art teacher Njabulo Hlongwane and learners from Silwane Primary School in Inanda to make line cut Tshirts; Hillcrest Aids Centre Trust (with support of various corporates including Nampak) working with various crafters; Crushed Lemon working with various projects making bags and shoes from recycled PVC billboards – including six emerging fashion designers participating in the July fashion preview at Gateway.
Exhibition – Durban Art Gallery:
eCF is facilitating a month-long exhibition to be held in the Durban Art Gallery from 15 November to 15 December, showcasing some of the projects under the umbrella of eCF. The exhibition will be in partnership with Wildlands Conservation Trust’s Art for Conservation.
Sustainable Cities Exhibition:
The team from Imagine Durban have donated eight stands at the Sustainable Cities Exhibition to eCF showcase the foundation’s projects and to enable sales and marketing opportunities for those who are making products out of waste, particularly from community-based organisations.
Building Classrooms:
Tapping into the city’s sister city relationship, Garforth Academy near Leeds, UK are being supported by eCF in their project to build a computer classrooms at their sister high-schools, Umzevelo, made from recycled waste. The project is supported by the City Architects; Use-It (implementing partners of the Municipality) and Cyclocor, a Durban-based company who have innovated such that they make green roof tiles from recycled plastic mixed with sand. The tiles are partly made from printer cartridges which can no longer be refurbished, and which, at GreenABLE, – a project of Green Office – are picked apart by disabled women, while Use-It make building blocks. It is hoped that the desks will be made from waste donated by Afripak as part of a design project of the Architecture Dept at DUT, and the eCF is looking for funding for a prize for first-year architecture students to design desks made from recycled materials so that the most innovative desk can be used in computer classrooms.
Rhino Parade:
The Rhino Parade is an innovative campaign, based on the internationally renowned Cow Parade concept, aimed at profiling the plight of South Africa’s rhino whilst raising funds to support Wildlands’ rhino conservation efforts, through the use of celebrities and ¾ life size rhino sculptures. The first leg of the Rhino Parade was launched in November 2011 which collectively raised just over R600 000. The Durban leg of the parade will be launched by Springbok Rugby Player, Pat Lambie and a few other celebrities, all passionate about fighting the rhino poaching crisis.
The eThekwini Municipality are adding a unique rhino to the Durban parade, and instead of using a celebrity to endorse and inspire their creation they are involving several local craft partners of eCF to convey a universal message about our environmental heritage, essential to our survival as a species and particularly important to our region in terms of tourism.
Subz Panties and Pads:
Addressing a major challenge for rural school girls is accessibility to affordable feminine hygiene products, and lack of such access is the single biggest reason why girls don’t finish high school. Sue Barnes supported by Ndledla are working to roll-out washable attachable sanitary towel and panty sets with the intention of making them available to school girls across the country.
Modular Rape Clinic:
eCF is helping to facilitate a public-private partnership to create specialised modular mobile rape clinics and place them where they are needed the most, an initiative arising out of an Imagine Durban and Safer Cities research project. eCF is working with designers who are looking at a prototype, low-maintenance, enviro-friendly modular units, such as those produced by ParkHomes, which can be attached to electrical mains and water supply.
Humanitarian Notes:
Humanitarian Notes is an existing international NGO which has been operational in Namibia, Liberia and Ghana. The project involves supporting unrecorded musicians who make music with a social message. Musician and social entrepreneur, Daniel Cwirka, a New Yorker, is looking to liaise with local partners, to establish a presence in Durban.
For more information, contact Kathryn Kure at 083 252 0992 or email: kureks@durban.gov.za.