Encouraging update!

One of my 2020 highlights was our Stimulus Jubilee Giving Week in May. I was so proud of how our community stepped up to do right by those hit hardest by COVID and helped least by the government. We set our all-time Giving Week record!

But I confess that in the weird time warp of the pandemic summer and fall, I kind of lost track of what was happening with those impacted by our giving. So I was deeply encouraged today when I caught up on the latest from CWOWer Paige Balcom, CTO of Takataka Plastics in Uganda.

Since our last Giving Week, while we’ve been coping with Zoom fatigue and collecting facemasks (our family now has a dozen), this is what Takataka has been doing:

“We’ve created sixteen jobs (nine of them for former street youth), recycled over 1,000 kg of plastic waste into new products, educated more than 40,000 people about plastic waste and recycling, manufactured and distributed more than 10,000 face shields to frontline medical workers and teachers across Uganda….”

But it’s not just impressive numbers–for the very first time, Takataka has provided local, in-town solutions for recycling the ubiquitous plastic bottles that used to end up as litter or acrid smoke from trash fires.

I’m so grateful we had the privilege of investing in this great work. It feels like we got in on the IPO of an amazing Kingdom startup!

For more encouraging details, check out Paige’s blog from last month. Thanks, Paige, Peter, and Takataka, for showing us what shalom looks like!