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To generate income to invest into the local community, we are making use of Mbamba Bay’s main asset – the beautiful surroundings! Mbamba Bay is situated on the shore of Lake Nyasa in Tanzania.
Hoja Project has worked to acquire land on the beach, which is being developed into a sustainable lodge, restaurant and sustainable agriculture demonstration site named ‘Hoja Beach’. With the support of Cititec, we have so far been able to implement sustainable agriculture on the site and hope to begin development of the restaurant and lodge in the coming year.
All proceeds from the beach will be reinvested into the local community, which suffers from poor education infrastructure and a high prevalence of HIV/AIDS.
In August, a community health education day was held at the beach, to celebrate it’s opening. It was expected that 200 people would attend, but the excitement of the community was demonstrated by 550 people showing up! Sports, games, tribal dances, performances and speeches were used to give education on health issues, such as the prevention of malaria and HIV/AIDS.
The event this year was a big success. Nearly all the participants who completed the questionnaire stated that they knew more about HIV/AIDS than they did before the event and would rate the event ‘very good’. Around half of the questionnaire responses stated that they hadn’t been to an event like this before which proves that this event has given some people an opportunity to learn something new.
Educating parents, caregivers and other family members on important issues such as how to prevention and treatment of communicable diseases like HIV/AIDS and malaria means that children will be healthy in schools and parents will be healthy enough to work, and money will be saved on healthcare bills.
This event was a great way to celebrate the opening of Hoja Beach, which will generate funds to significantly benefit the local community.