Project

2- Muima Toys Bicycle Crate Kenya

Walking through Amsterdam, the capital city of the Netherlands, you have to watch your

step for cyclists coming from every single direction. There is no street without  cyclists

and there’s no street without bicycles parked. About one fifth, estimated with what is

seen on the streets, of the bicycles in the Netherlands have a crate in front of the

handlebar, generally made out of wood or plastic. The crates are used for the transport

of for example, grocery,  which basically comes down to plastic wrapped articles in

plastic bags. Luckily most of this plastic ends up in bins and nowadays also in special

plastic bins to be recycled. Imagine this doesn’t happen, and the entire beautiful city

would be drowning in plastic waste. Unfortunately, this is happening in other countries.

Globally, over 260 million tonnes of plastic is produced every year. Nearly one trillion

plastic bags are produced and used globally per annum. More than half of these plastic

bags, the most important user of plastic materials, end up in urban waste streams.

(Oyake‐Ombis, 2012)

Bicycles in the Netherlands

Figure 1.1 – an impression of bicycles with crates in the Netherlands

 

Let’s zoom in on Kenya, where plastic waste is a big problem. In the major cities

of Kenya, namely Nairobi, Mombasa, Kisumu and Nakuru, plastic waste constitutes

about ten per cent of the cities’ waste streams. In Kenya 192,836 tonnes of plastic

material is produced each year, conducted by the Kenya National Cleaner Production

Centre. More than half of bags end up in the solid waste stream (Oyake‐Ombis, 2012). All

off  this plastic waste has a bad influence on the environment; it results in dying animals,

smutty seas and streets, poor growing plants and disturbed ecosystems. This problem

has to be under the attention and has to be solved.

A company who wants to be a part of this accomplishment is Muima Toy

Industries, an injection moulding company in Kenya. The business is an initiative of

Wilson Mzungu, who is the owner of the factory. Muima Toy Industries turns used

plastics into plates, sandals but mainly toy cars. The industry started in 2003. Mzungu

has nine employees working in the factory and together they produce 200 cars a day.

These cars are being sold on the local Kenyan market. The plastic waste is collected from

the streets by homeless people that get paid for doing so. Through Muima Toy Industries

(Hereinafter referred to as ‘MTI’), not only nine Kenyan families are being supported,

but the living environment of the people in Muima improves as well. Wilson Mzungu is

also devoted to the wellbeing of orphans teaching them entrepreneurial skills for a

potentially brighter future. These days MTI would like to expand its business to the

Dutch market. For this purpose a bicycle crate was developed and produced in 2011.

How great would it be; you are walking through Amsterdam where all the bicycles with

the crates on this moment, instead will have the bicycle crate from MTI on their bicycle.

Known that there are made out of recycled plastic that improved the environment in the

Kenyan streets. This would be a dream come true.

Wilson en vrouw.jpg

Figure 1.2 – Wilson Mzungu and his wife

toy cars.PNG

 Figure 1.3 – The toy cars

 

We, a group of four students from de TU Delft, want to realize this dream.

Our names are Carolien van Mens, Esmée de Bruijn, Reinoud de Klerk & Marijn Duvekot.

We are studying respectively Maritime Technology, Applied Earth Sciences and Civil

Engineering. While writing this, we are about to start the Minor International

Entrepreneurship & Development. Our wide variety of knowledge is going to be helpful,

because every occurring problem will, without even regarding personal interests and

skills, be approached from at least three different angles. We are very much looking

forward to start with the following six months.

Wij met 4.jpg

Figure 1.4 – Esmee de Bruijn, Reinoud de Klerk, Marijn Duvekot and Carolien van Mens

 

Our contact with Wilson Mzungu is initiated by Emma van Bruggen en Lotte Jacobse. In

2013 Lotte and Emma van came in contact with Guido Potters, an Industrial Designer

who works with Doctors Without Borders in Kenya. He was enthusiastic about a plastic

recycle company in the city of Muimas and already tried to help Wilson Mzungu, the

owner of the recycling factory, during his spare time. The enthusiasm of Guido has

inspired Emma to start ‘Relive Plastic’. Whilst working on this project they developed a

bicycle crate for the Dutch market with the help of a Dutch bicycle factory. The

development and the realisation of the crate, however, didn’t go as planned and took

longer than they thought.

After a long time of working on the crate, Lotte and Emma received an email of Wilson

Mzungu with pictures of a realised prototype of the bicycle crate in the spring of 2016.

Happily surprised this was reason enough for Emma and Lotte to approach the TU Delft

to send a new project team towards Muima Toy Industries in Kenya.

Unfortunately the bicycle crate does not yet reach the requirements of the

stricter and exacting Dutch market. Beside the goal of reaching the Dutch market, this is

an important part we have to work on, where many challenges have to overcome. We

are very much looking forward working on the project together with Wilson Mzungu.

Let’s hope the first container filled with bicycle crates will serve the Dutch market when

our work is done.

het krat.jpg

Figure 1.5 – the bicycle crate

 

This rapport is written by Carolien van Mens, Esmée de Bruijn, Reinoud de Klerk &

Marijn Duvekot, as presented earlier. From now on we will refer to our team as ‘Relive

Plastic’. In this rapport we will discuss the following points,  first off the project will be

described and the approach will be discussed. After that we will analyse respectively

Muima Toys Industries, the crate, plastics, and Kenya itself.

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