Seattle, WA – Over 80% of Kenyan households use charcoal and/or firewood as their primary source of cooking fuel every day. Smoke from these cooking fuels kill 4.3 million people worldwide each year, and the majority are women and children in Africa and developing Asia. More people die from incremental, ongoing inhalation of smoke from their own homes than from malaria, tuberculosis, and HIV/AIDS combined.
GreenChar is a for-profit social enterprise in Kenya producing and distributing healthier, eco-friendly charcoal briquettes made from recycled sugarcane agricultural waste. Their Makaa Poa briquettes are affordable, nearly smokeless, higher energy, and longer lasting than conventional wood charcoal and firewood. “Makaa Poa” means “cool charcoal.”
Makaa Poa is designed to make the cooking experience cleaner and safer. It produces almost no smoke when burned, and therefore reduces the risk of getting respiratory tract infections by over 80% – a true win for households in rural and peri-urban Kenya. Makaa Poa is not only affordable, it is also longer lasting. Beyond letting families save money upfront, using less fuel to cook more food allows these families to save about $200 annually – enough for a semester of school in Kenya.
In addition to the direct benefits to customers, recycling agricultural waste into charcoal briquettes also curbs local deforestation. Kenya loses 52,000 hectares of forest trees every year for biomass – that’s about the equivalent of 15,000 football fields. Black carbon from wood fuels is the second-leading cause of global warming in the world. Makaa Poa lets you reduce your carbon footprint and save trees. One kilogram of Makaa Poa offsets 5 kg of wood that would have been cut down to make charcoal. It also saves over 20 kg of carbon emissions into the atmosphere.
[L] Makaa Poa briquettes are made from recycled sugarcane waste. [R] Tom Osborn founded GreenChar when he was only 18 years old. At 19, he is now a Forbes 30 under 30 Social Entrepreneur and the youngest Echoing Green Fellow.
Living in rural Kenya, GreenChar’s founder Tom Osborn experienced firsthand the devastating effects of using wood fuels in a Kenyan household. His mother was diagnosed with a respiratory tract infection caused by household air pollution. Realizing that her story was not unique and that there are nearly 10 million women in Kenya like her, Tom began GreenChar when he was only 18. GreenChar was founded in a classroom at Alliance High School, in Kenya. Later, Yina Sun and Emmanuel Onsongo would join to form the founding team.
Since 2014, GreenChar has grown in leap and bounds. They have created partnerships with Echoing Green, MIT, World Bank’s Climate Innovation Center, and many others. They have won numerous awards and recently launched a production facility in Awendo, Kenya. They are now rolling out distribution across the country.
Mad Dog Seattle worked with GreenChar to design new packaging for their consumer product bags, and fabric tags for their commercial 25 kg bag.
GreenChar was recently chosen to participate in the Fledge “conscious company accelerator” program in Seattle. The program takes place at the Seattle Impact Hub, a co-working space and launching pad for purpose-driven ventures like the Fledge group – a 10-week intensive business program. This year’s “fledglings” are an all-international group of entrepreneurs. Visiting from Argentina, Kenya, Nigeria, Uganda, and Zambia, they are focused on solving problems of poverty, hunger, waste, and deforestation using for-profit business models.
While at the Hub, GreenChar worked with Mad Dog Seattle to create new packaging for Makaa Poa’s 2- and 5-kilogram consumer bags, and fabric tags for a 25-kilogram commercial bag.
The consumer bags were designed using kraft-colored paper, keeping in mind that black charcoal smudges and that the bags are sold in piles along rural streets; the bags needed to appear sturdy and resist looking dirty prior to being sold. The bags include information in both English and Swahili.
GreenChar opened their new production facility in Awendo, Kenya in November 2014.
Mad Dog was thrilled to be able to work with this innovative and socially responsible startup. For more about GreenChar, visit their website: http://www.greenchar.co.ke.
Thanks to Makaa Poa’s nearly smokeless briquettes, homes in Kenya and beyond will be breathing easier – with a much lower chance of developing respiratory illnesses.