Visit with Didas and EMORG

The community library under construction

       Last Tuesday, Aneesh and I got a chance to meet Didas, co-founder of EMORG and build on a relationship started by the Spring travelers. Didas graciously picked us up and drove out 25 minutes to the village of Kisongo where EMORG has began to build facilities to aid the education of the village children. Under construction was a community library to be filled with donated books, discussion centers for guided discussion of what the children had learned, as well as classrooms for enrichment courses on the weekends. EMORG and Didas's vision is that they can motivate children and enrich their education through these buildings and hiring teachers. Then, the stanard of living will hopefully rise with the increasing education level of the community.

In addition to hearing about EMORG's future goals, we also clarified the DHE bioenergy project's place in those plans. Part of the educational aims of EMORG involves motivating locals to design and innovate to solve every day problems. Didas believes that the stove project would be an ideal model project to present to the community as an example of a product designed to serve community needs. Outside of the community library, there will be several booths set up to present the work of EMORG's various collaborators. Didas expressed his desire for us to present our ongoing work and create a permanent display of the stove project in one of the booths. As a group in a part of an academic institution, we would be greatly excited to help in the education of local children.  

Additionally, Didas and EMORG's strong connections within Kisongo and various other small communities present other possibilities directly related to the stove. For example, Didas and serveral locals who saw us visiting expressed interest in our project and would be excited to test it given the high cost of charcoal in Kisongo. Furthermore, Didas noted that there is a very popular weekly marketplace that serves Kisongo and the surrounding communities. There is a possibility of marketing our technology or doing demonstrations in a stand of the market. Didas expressed hopes that once our design is presented in public and has started being used, citizens will naturally develop the stoves on their own.

On the drive home with Didas, we noticed an extensive coffee plantation bordering a village near Kisongo. We expressed interest in the coffee husk this plantation produces as well as working with the people living on the plantation. Because EMORG is coincidentally moving their offices to this exact village, Didas was able to introduce us to the village leaders. Upon hearing our plans and goals, the village leaders  approved of our worked there and sought to set a meeting between us, them, and the people of the plantation. We are very excited to meet with them soon and see how we can help this community with our projects.

Our visit with Didas and EMORG was a very useful and fruitful visit. It clarified our collaboration with EMORG as well as showed us possible sites for user testing of the coffee husk stove in Kisongo and the nearby plantation. We look forward to working with EMORG and Didas in the future with educational outreach and user testing in local villages.

- Kevin