Monday 29 April 2013

Conference Key Note Speakers from Africa will Amaze and Inform

One aspect of Rotary Involvement is the opportunity to attend the annual Rotary conference and hear some amazing interesting and / or motivational speakers that help open the opportunities that are available for all.

Here is an example:


Districts 9970 and 9930 are holding their conferences in Methven and Napier in May at which the combined attendance will be in the vicinity of 900.

Key Note Speakers at both have travelled from East Africa and will be giving an insight on one of the most successful projects that Rotary New Zealand supported by the New Zealand Government have undertaken.

The Kondiki Milk Processing Plant, a co-operative dairy of 210 mostly women members, has become a major source of livelihoods and income for local families.  The facility is now the most up-to-date and modern automatic milk processing plant in Tanzania, as a result of the direct investment of the New Zealand Government and Rotary New Zealand. The Plant initially had the capacity to process 800 litres of milk per day, and has increased its processing capacity to more than 5,000 litres per day. 

As a result of the earlier activity the plant is increasing its daily processing and is on a trajectory to process 2,000 litres daily from existing co-operative members by September 2013 (as a result of gradually increasing numbers of milk producing cows from the cow bank system) in the medium term.  However, 2,000 litres is the maximum projected supply from members.  The supply of raw milk is limited by the number of cows and quality of breed, inadequate animal husbandry and green feed management, and because marketing strategies are still developing.

PP Dr.Sadikiel Kimaro Ph.D. in economics

Born the youngest of 6 children in 1941 on a coffee farm in Mwika, on the slopes of Mt. Kilimanjaro, Tanzania. He came to the U.S. on Afro-American scholarship programme in 1960. He has a BA from Gustavus Adolfus College (magna cum laude) in St. Paul, MN; an MA from Syracuse University, and earned a Ph.D. from SUNY, Binghamton where he studied under a Rockerfeller scholarship.

In 1971, he began his life-long career with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) which took him to almost all countries on the African continent and to the Caribbean. In 1990, he was a visiting scholar with the Brookings’ Institute in Washington DC while he was on sabbatical leave from the IMF. There, his area of focus was on conflict resolution.
Upon retiring as advisor from the IMF in 1999 he served briefly as Economic advisor to the then President of Tanzania until 2005. Since then he has devoted full time to community development as a Rotarian and as chairman of the Mwika Development Trust Fund (MWIDEFU).

Young Kimaro Ph.D. candidate, economics

Born the youngest of 6 children in 1946 in Seoul, Korea. Her brief stint as a child actress on TV came to a stop when she left for U.K. with her parents where she attended school from grades 6 to 10. She has a BA in political science from Yonsei University (magna cum laude), Korea. A Fullbright scholarship took her to the U.S. where she studied African politics at SUNY, Binghamton.

She joined the World Bank in 1972, attended the University of Maryand graduate school with World Bank sponsorship and became a Ph.D. candidate in economics in 1987. Her career with the World Bank, spanned from strategizing development assistance, education projects, and moderating quality review panels for World Bank operations.

Upon retiring from the World Bank in 2001, for 7 years she wrote a weekly column “Development with Commonsense” in the Daily News, a national newspaper in Tanzania. Now she devotes full time to community development for Mwika Development Trust Fund (MWIDEFU) and as a Rotarian.


Website:  www.rnzwcs.org