Objective

We believe that a bicycle can make a difference in this world for reasons of health, poverty alleviation, environment, etc. Therefore, we are implementing several bicycle interventions which contribute to the Millennium Development Goals.

The objective of CooP-Africa is to improve access (availability and accessibility) to a bicycle as a means for poverty reduction and initiating and promoting bicycle interventions that can contribute to improving the lives of African families.

Accessibility is one of the most important factors in development. Access to schools, access to hospital and access to jobs. African women and children walk long distances every day, often carrying many kilos of firewood and water on their heads. Walking to reach schools, health facilities or areas where they can work. A bicycle can break the vicious circle of poverty because it offers Africans the opportunity to climb (or cycle) out of poverty. A bicycle creates opportunities for:
• increasing income (because it can carry more products to the market, markets can be visited more often and more time can be spent on other activities), diversifying income (for instance besides planting bananas it creates time for making handicrafts, which makes their income less vulnerable to shocks as banana diseases and droughts), new opportunities on the job market (for instance bicycle taxi) (millennium development goal 1)
• better access to schools, health centres (millennium development goals 2, 5, 6).
• medical staff and teachers to move around quicker and to cover a larger area (millennium development goals 4, 5, 6).
• a more equal position for women and men in a household (millennium development goal 3).