The Family Alliance for Development and Cooperation (FADECO) works for the sustainable development of grassroots communities in the Kagera Region. We conduct environmental enterprise projects such as solar drying technologies, and environmental conservation through renewable energy technologies and media.
For decades, we have worked on enhancing the possibilities to create ‘chains of telecentres’, which have improved local communication and reduce bandwidth costs through sharing Internet access. We set up our first telecentre in 2001 without an Internet connection, using only offline resources. And in 2002, a local area network (LAN) was set up with 4 computers while 2004 came with a center which was connected to the Internet via a VSAT – small satellite dish installed at end-user locations – with the number of computers expanding to 12.
From this point on, we started to supply Internet services to schools. Over the years, we have maintained our services; including our library services, access to books, and other printed materials including CDs that contain information dating back to many ages ago.
With extensive investment in our skills development facility and staff training, we have achieved big success in excellent service delivery.
The success of FADECO activities is a joint work of FADECO and different partners at international, national and local levels who in one way or another have contributed to the efforts of increasing access to information resources for the underserved in Kagera region; appropriate technology innovations in rural communities. The development partners at the international level have been supporting FADECO’s efforts to undertake programmes and projects.
FADECO has been working with many national institutions or partners. The most prominent among our many partners are Research Institutions, the University of Agriculture at Morogoro, government departments, national NGOs, etc. FADECO has been collaborating with the Government of Tanzania and other national stakeholders to strengthen the capacity of developing knowledge sharing and sustainable renewable energy services and influence policies, strategies and national programmes.
Joseph Sekiku is the Director and Founder of FADECO in Karagwe, Tanzania. He improves economic opportunities for small-scale farmers by advising them on how to strengthen post-production control over their products and get greater access to global markets. In 2007, he was elected an Ashoka Fellow, an international NGO supporting social entrepreneurship.