News & Updates

KickStart Named to The Global Journal's Top 100 Best NGO List

2012-01-24T22:11:24Z

In the first international ranking of its kind, this week KickStart was named one of the TOP 100 BEST NGOs IN THE WORLD by the renowned publication The Global Journal. KickStart was cited for "changing the way the world fights poverty by bringing together the transformative power of technology, the entrepreneurial spirit of the impoverished, and the sustainability of the marketplace and private sector." This honor comes just one month after KickStart was named to the Forbes TOP 30 IMPACT LIST, a list of the world's leading social entrepreneurs.

The Global Journal sought to honor top NGOs who exhibit "the power of a great idea, well-executed." The bi-monthly publication features innovative and influential ideas, in-depth reports, stunning photography and authoritative voices, and is the first medium fully dedicated to the international community of decision makers.

We share this honor with everyone who has followed our growth and supported our work in Africa. KickStart is about people helping other people to permanently escape poverty.

You can continue to help others by clicking HERE.

KickStart Mobile Layaway Program Update

2011-12-08T18:16:37Z

Innovative Financing for the Small-holder Farmer

KickStart has designed and introduced an exciting new solution to get more pumps into action: micro-payments via cell phones. Mobile Layaway, marketed as "Tone Kwa Tone Pata Pump" (Swahili for "Drop by Drop Gets the Pump") enables customers to make mobile payments of any amount, at any frequency, using M-PESA, a mobile money transfer system used by over 13.5 million subscribers in Kenya. Mobile layaway provides a convenient, secure method of saving up for a MoneyMaker pump, and helps customers commit to the purchase before they have the full amount.

Now in the first phase of roll out, 126 customers are registered, and 69 have already paid in full and received their pumps!

Mobile Layaway:

Shortens the time to purchase a MoneyMaker pump: Mobile layaway customers say that if they could have done it at all, it would have taken them a very long time to pay for a pump. While it takes most customers as long as one year to save for and purchase a MoneyMaker pump, using the mobile layaway service to complete full payment takes an average of only 2.5 months.

Enables KickStart to reach an even poorer income segment: The majority of customers say that without mobile layaway, they would never have been able to purchase the pump. The average Mobile Layaway customer owns less land, livestock, & household assets than KickStart's average MoneyMaker customer.

Enables KickStart to reach more women: Only 18% of customers who buy pumps in cash are women, yet 31% of the customers who have registered for mobile layaway are women.

Increased pump sales:Since February 2011, we have experienced an 8% increase in pump sales in the areas of Kenya where the Mobile Layaway service is being offered.

KickStart Awarded 4-Star Rating from Charity Navigator

2011-12-02T21:42:27Z

Read our letter below from Ken Berger, Charity Navigator’s president & CEO, informing KickStart that we have received a 4-star rating from Charity Navigator, America's largest and most-utilized independent evaluator of charities.

Dear Martin Fisher:

On behalf of Charity Navigator, I wish to congratulate KickStart International on achieving our coveted 4-star rating for sound fiscal management and commitment to accountability and transparency.

As the nonprofit sector continues to grow at an unprecedented pace, savvy donors are demanding more accountability,transparency and quantifiable results from the charities they choose to support with their hard-earned dollars. In this competitive philanthropic marketplace, Charity Navigator, America's premier charity evaluator, highlights the fine work of efficient, ethical and open charities.

Our goal in all of this is to provide donors with essential information needed to give them greater confidence in the charitable choices they make. Based on the most recent information available and using our new, two dimensional rating system (CN 2.0) we have issued a new rating for your organization. We are proud to announce KickStart International has earned a 4-star rating. Receiving four out of a possible four stars indicates that your organization adheres to good governance and other best practices that minimize the chance of unethical activities and consistently executes its mission in a fiscally responsible way. Approximately a quarter of the charities we evaluate have received our highest rating, indicating that KickStart International outperforms most other charities in America. This “exceptional” designation from Charity Navigator differentiates KickStart International from its peers and demonstrates to the public it is worthy of their trust.

Forbes, Business Week, and Kiplinger's Financial Magazine, among others, have profiled and celebrated our unique method of applying data-driven analysis to the charitable sector. We evaluate ten times more charities than our nearest competitor and currently attract more visitors to our website than all other charity rating groups combined, thus making us the leading charity evaluator in America. Our data shows that users of our site gave more than they planned to before viewing our findings, and in fact, it is estimated that last year Charity Navigator influenced approximately $10 billion in charitable gifts.

We believe our service will enhance your organization's fundraising and public relations efforts. Our favorable review of KickStart International's fiscal health and commitment to accountability & transparency will be visible on our website as of December 1st.

We wish you continued success in your charitable endeavors.

Sincerely,

Ken Berger
President & Chief Executive Officer

KickStart is Listed on Forbes' List of the Top 30 Social Entrepreneurs

2011-11-30T23:32:23Z

Helen Coster, Forbes Staff 11/30/2011

Darell Hammond read a Washington Post article about children who suffocated while playing in an abandoned car because they had nowhere else to play. Willy Foote met vanilla farmers in Mexico who didn't have access to credit and couldn't connect to markets. Sara Horowitz was working at a lawyer, didn't qualify for health insurance because she was considered a "freelancer," and started thinking about other people who faced the same problem. While working in Argentina, Linda Rottenberg wondered why more Latin American entrepreneurs didn't create global companies.

And then- unlike millions of us who recognize some kind of problem, feel a pang of hopelessness, and move on- Hammond, Foote and others shifted careers and set about fixing the problems they saw in the world.

For the first time in Forbes' 94-year history, we've assembled the Impact 30: a list of the world's leading social entrepreneurs. We're defining "social entrepreneur" as a person who uses business to solve social issues.

Take Part Video: Innovators in Action - Martin Fisher

2011-11-29T18:38:16Z

Martin Fisher: Pumping the Primer of Africa's Middle Class

KickStart cofounder on how low-cost tools can create wealth, not just jobs, in the developing world.

After her husband passed away from AIDS in 1997, Janet Ondiek was left to care for her family’s Kenyan vegetable farm all by herself. Using bucket irrigation, she made just a $115 profit per season that year—clearly not enough income to put food on the table or clothes on the backs of her nine children. But in 1999 Ondiek happened upon an invention that would change her life: the Super MoneyMaker, a pressure pump invented by KickStart in response to demand by farmers for a pump that could be used to irrigate steep land where the water source may be at the bottom. “In the first year, she made $3,200 profit,” says Martin Fisher, cofounder of KickStart, a company that designs, develops, and mass markets low-cost tools used by entrepreneurs in the developing world to get small businesses off the ground.

“It completely transformed her life—she’s managed to send her kids to good schools and open a shop in town,” says Fisher. As of 2010, KickStart has sold 140,000 pumps, which have been used to create 91,000 profitable businesses. These, in turn, have generated $92 million in profits, thereby lifting 455,000 out of poverty. “We really need to create that entrepreneurial middle class and give people an opportunity to create family businesses,” says Fisher. “That’s really what we’re about.”

TakePart travelled to the Skoll World Forum in Oxford, England, to pick the brains of the world’s biggest thinkers. These Innovators in Action are changing the face of the future with bold new ideas and profound enthusiasm. Motivated by personal experience and fueled by the hope that things can get better, these innovators—each of them true social entrepreneurs—are improving our world, one brilliant business idea at a time.

KickStart Honored on CIO (East Africa) Magazine's Top 100 ICT List

2011-11-28T18:20:02Z

Indeed it is a proud moment for KickStart to be recognized in the CIO Magazine's Top 100 companies using ICT (Information and Communications Technology) to add Business value. Last night KickStart was honored at the CIO 100 2011 Gala awards event held at Safari Park hotel in Nairobi, Kenya and awarded a position in the Top 100 companies.

There were more than 600 initiatives from East and Central Africa that were submitted in the competition and the Top 100 companies were recognized for their achievements and awarded. KickStart submitted our Mobile Layaway project which won us the number 30 spot on the list.

The full CIO Top 100 ICT List is as follows:

1 Kenya Education Network (KENET)
2 Eat Out Kenya
3 Nakumatt Holdings Limited
4 MobiKash Afrika Lmited
5 Usalama Innovative Systems
6 Nuru East Africa Ltd
7 Shimba Technologies Ltd
8 Kenya AIrways
9 Safaricom Limited
10 Equity Bank Limited
11 Directorate of e-Government
12 Royal Media
13 Virtual City Ltd
14 Propertyzote.com
15 United States International University
16 Kenya Revenue Authority
17 Airtel Africa
18 Technology Associates EA Limited
19 Seven Seas Technologies
20 Vision Group
21 mPedigree Network Kenya
22 Compulynx Limited
23 Waste Electrical & Eectronic Equipment Centre
24 Ethiopix Technology Lab
25 British American Insurance Company (Kenya) Limited
26 SISDO organization
27 Kenya Forestry Service
28 KEPHIS (Kenya Plant Health Inspectorate)
29 World Vision Kenya

30 KickStart

31 Directorate of e-Government
32 Arid Lands Information Network (ALIN)
33 Kenya Institute Of Education
34 Zege Technologies Limited
35 AskADoc
36 Juja St Peters School
37 Kenya Airports Parking services
38 Interconsumer Products Limited (Nice & Lovely)
39 Makini School Limited
40 Sarova Hotels Limited (e-commerce)
41 BTI Milmann Limited
42 CFAO Motors Tanzania Limited
43 Crystalint Media
44 Britania Allied Industries Ltd
45 Uganda Baati Ltd
46 Directorate of e-Government
47 Pluspeople Kenya ltd.
48 Public Complaints Standing Committee
49 Rafiki Deposit Taking Microfinance
50 IFMIS Department - Ministry Of Finance
51 National ICT Innovation and Integration Centre
52 Webmasters Africa Limited
53 PZ Cussons EA Ltd
54 Bavaria Auto
55 SalesIn4
56 Enterprise Information Management Solutions Limited
57 Sumaria Group
58 Somesha Limited
59 Craft Silicon Foundation
60 Postal Corporation of Kenya
61 Makerere University - Luo Translation Team (Uganda) COCIS
62 AccessKenya Group
63 Techno Brain BPO ITES Ltd.
64 MTN Business Kenya Limited
65 Africa Broadcasting (U) Ltd
66 CWRC-Community Wireless Research Center
67 Kabarak University
68 University of Nairobi
69 CIC Insurance Ggroup Limited
70 Wasp Africa Ltd
71 Kulture Store
72 Nairobi Stock Exchange
73 Attain Enterprise Solutions Ltd
74 Globetrack Intertional Limited
75 Simba Corporation
76 Kenya Methodist University
77 GESTALT GILD
78 REAL Insurance Co Ltd
79 Paradise Safari Park Hotel
80 Chase Bank (Kenya) Ltd
81 National Housing and Construction Company
82 Billionare Fund Ltd
83 Greenbell Communications Ltd
84 African Council for Distance Education
85 Belladonn Pharmacy Ltd
86 Kenya Institute of Management
87 Silafrica Limted
88 Uganda Revenue Authority
89 Best Tech System
90 Farm Engineering Industries Ltd
91 Farmers Choice Limited
92 Alliance High School
93 Family Bank Ltd
94 Sameer Africa Limited
95 DHL Express
96 Dutch Quality systems
97 ESBC Ltd
98 Jimcab Services Ltd
99 Scangroup Ltd
100 Shumuk Aluminium Industries Ltd

KickStart is a Hall STEPS Foundation Grant Recipient for Fall 2011

2011-11-21T20:08:15Z

KickStart is excited to announce that it has been chosen, along with WorldVision, by The Hall STEPS Foundation as one of their Fall 2011 grant recipients!

We are looking forward to working with the Foundation to contribute to innovative efforts in Kenya that focus on social enterprise and long-term sustainability!

The STEPS Foundation was founded in late 2009 by professional runners Ryan and Sara Hall, The Hall Steps Foundation is a non-profit movement to fight global poverty through better health. Their goal is to build a community and provide each member an opportunity to take their own STEPS toward relieving suffering and helping the poor rise out of poverty. They are a lifestyle philanthropy that encourages their supporters to make a personal commitment to their own health and wellness, using that as a catalyst to ignite change and make a difference in the lives of others.

Looking to Africa for Innovation

2011-11-18T20:25:57Z

Nikki Wilson and Rob Wilson
Guardian Professional, Friday 18 November 2011 05.16 EST

British social entrepreneurs limit themselves by using conventional models but can learn from innovative projects overseas, argue Nikki and Rob Wilson

We fight hard to convince ourselves that the developing world can learn a lot from our western ways, but how often do we turn the table and look to continents like Africa for advice? Never. Yet, like it or not, our worlds share many of the same societal challenges and there are a multitude of social entrepreneurs leading projects which could teach us a lesson or two.

One Kenya-based project provokes plenty of food for thought. The vision of David Kuria, IkoToilet is a professional outfit which builds toilet blocks in urban spaces across the country. For just 3p, an affordable price for all, the general public can go to an Ikotoilet and access clean, hygienic and safe facilities. Before IkoToilet this service simply didn't exist and is now used by 30,000 people every day.

But here's the twist which make his social business a profitable venture. The Ikotoilet block is also known as a 'toilet mall'. The space surrounding the loo block is rented to local businesses and the wall space is sold for brand advertising. Income from entry fees, rent revenue and advertising deals covers all the overheads of each Ikotoilet and leaves enough left over to repay Kuria's investment loan. In fact, within five years each toilet mall will be turning a tidy profit which will be reinvested into the future growth of the organization.

Let's also look to Kick Start in Kenya. Founded by Nick Moon and Martin Fischer, Kick Start has helped 600,000 people out of poverty by selling tailored technology to smallholder farmers which allows them to transform the productivity of their land and sell their crops for a lot more cash. We're not suggesting that we solve the UK's unemployment issues by sending everyone into the countryside with a sparkling set of tools, but the principles behind Kick Start do have a lot to offer our thinking.

Before Kick Start, Nick and Martin spent years working for a major international NGO but grew tired of leading projects which drove no sustainable change and worse, nurtured a culture of dependency on handouts. They made a break with the conventional model so that instead of putting a plaster on a problem, they were driving real and lasting change. Sustainability can be a painful buzz word but this is an important question: is your social venture really driving change that's going to stick?

Kick Start is an organization that also backs the merits of business. Their beneficiaries become serious business people who take their stake in the market economy. The organization itself is commercially savvy and believes that welcoming competitors into their market is key to even greater success.

Moon admits that a lot of this business astuteness is thanks to him studying an MBA (certainly not everyone's cup of tea) and that the commercial world can teach us a lot. Business consultants might be a bore, but do you spend enough time burying your head in business thinking?

Finding a way to make your venture into a profitable social business might not always appear obvious or easy but Kick Start and Ikotoilet are great beacons for the opportunities that are out there. In the UK we don't look enough at more innovative ways of raising money . Nearly every charitable cause raises money through the same tiring channels without daring to do it differently. If you forced yourself to think about making money and not raising money, could you break this mold?

I'm sure, like the best of us, you endlessly compare your organization to others but how often do you look overseas? These examples from Kenya are just two of the myriad of case studies across Africa which can lend thought provoking insights. So whether it's Africa or elsewhere, I challenge you to do this: open your eyes to a wider audience and look further afield for a fresh perspective.

Nikki and Rob Wilson are co-founders of On the Up, a social venture to profile Africa's most inspirational social entrepreneurs. Their work is currently being collated into a book which will be published next year.

Turning smallholder farmers into business people

2011-11-07T17:54:34Z

Agriculture, Feature Articles, Tanzania | Jaco Maritz | November 4, 2011 at 18:22

KickStart, an NGO founded 20 years ago in Kenya, aims boost the incomes of smallholder farmers, not through handouts, but by selling them tools to improve their output. The company produces small-scale irrigation pumps that can increase farm income by up to 1,000%.

KickStart has a direct presence in five countries on the continent, namely Kenya, Tanzania, Mali, Burkina Faso and Zambia. It also has an office in San Francisco, mostly for fundraising purposes.

The pumps, branded MoneyMaker, are manually operated, either by hand or foot. They can pull water up from 7 metres and the most expensive model is capable of irrigating close to 1 hectare of land.

Read the rest of this article HERE

KickStart Featured in Treehugger.com Article

2011-09-23T18:57:31Z

Solar Sister and NextAid Showcase 5 Promising Technologies for Africa
by Rachel Cernansky, Boulder, Colorado

A Little Human Effort, A Lot of Water

The Hip Pump is a human-powered water pump from Kickstart, an organization that understands what many in the aid world do not: "Poor people are not victims awaiting rescue." Kickstart's Mimi Evans said the pump helps people grow food and improves agricultural yields, but what it really is, in her eyes, is a tool people can use to rise out of poverty.

KickStart Announces New Commitment at the Clinton Global Initiative 2011

2011-09-20T18:20:57Z

This week Martin Fisher, CEO of KickStart International will be announcing a new commitment at the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) entitled KickStart - Half a Million People out of Poverty. With the announcement of this commitment, KickStart will create 100,000 agribusinesses that will lift half a million people out of poverty over the next three years. Through our proven market-based solution, KickStart's pumps quickly enable poor African farmers to lift themselves from poverty to middle class in as little as four months. Our technologies and model are ideal for the world's poorest farmers. By enabling farmers to access water year round, even in drought, we provide critical tools farmers need not only to safeguard their crops against future drought and climatic emergencies, but to lift themselves and their families out of poverty permanently.

KickStart's commitment announced this week at CGI 2011 can be seen here using the search term “KickStart”.

About the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI)

Established in 2005 by President Bill Clinton, the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) convenes global leaders to devise and implement innovative solutions to some of the world's most pressing challenges. Since 2005, CGI Annual Meetings have brought together nearly 150 current and former heads of state, 18 Nobel Prize laureates, hundreds of leading CEOs, heads of foundations, major philanthropists, directors of the most effective nongovernmental organizations, and prominent members of the media. These CGI members have made nearly 2,000 commitments, which have already improved the lives of 300 million people in more than 180 countries. When fully funded and implemented, these commitments will be valued in excess of $63 billion. The 2011 Annual Meeting will take place Sept. 20-22 in New York City.

This year, CGI also convened CGI America, a meeting focused on developing ideas for driving economic growth in the United States. The CGI community also includes CGI U, which hosts an annual meeting for undergraduate and graduate students, and CGI Lead, which engages a select group of young CGI members for leadership development and collective commitment-making. For more information, visit www.clintonglobalinitiative.org.

Karibu! KickStart's Fall 2011 Newsletter

2011-09-14T16:30:44Z

Please click through to read!

Karibu! - KickStart Newsletter - Fall 2011.pdf

Changemakers "On the Up"

2011-09-12T21:38:26Z

Their blog, "On the Up", details Rob & Nikki Wilson's journey to discover Africa's most inspirational social entrepreneurs.Please check out their profile of KickStart and our Co-Founder, Nick Moon, here. Thank you Rob & Nikki!

A Special Letter from Martin and Nick about the Famine

2011-08-09T17:45:29Z

Dear Friends of KickStart,

We are reaching out to you because as a friend of KickStart you are a friend of Africa. We know you are aware of the dreadful famine in Kenya, Somalia and Ethiopia. Thousands have already died, and more are dying every day.

But millions more are desperate, teetering on the brink. They need your help now!

So please donate today and help KickStart help them survive.

Droughts and famine result from climate change. When farmers can no longer predict rainfall, their crops fail, their pastures dry up and their animals die. Whole families are left destitute, with no food to eat and not even enough water to drink.

For the past 12 years KickStart’s MoneyMaker pumps have been helping poor farmers in Africa to access water. Over 120,000 farmers are already using them to pull water from ponds, rivers and shallow wells to irrigate crops and water livestock. Even when the rains fail they grow high value crops, make money and escape poverty.

In Eastern Kenya, which suffered a terrible drought a few years ago, thousands of families are now using MoneyMaker pumps to irrigate from shallow wells and water catchments, and can grow food even in this dry season.

KickStart is now ready to launch a major effort to help the drought victims in Kenya. We will:

1. Visit stricken regions where disaster can still be averted if people get water and grow food

2. Identify the sites where farmers can use our pumps

3. Distribute pumps to farmers and train them to water animals and irrigate fast growing crops

In addition, KickStart will partner with relief agencies working in the whole drought-affected region to help reach more families in need, and train local shops to sell pumps and spare parts in the stricken areas.

This effort will bring water to thousands of people and their animals and quickly get hundreds of acres under cultivation. It will enable families to survive not only this drought, but also to be prepared for and survive future droughts that will inevitably strike again.

KickStart can’t do this alone. We urgently need your help! We need funds to pay for transport, pumps and staff to bring water to those in desperate need. Your gift at this time will save families who are teetering on the edge—enabling them to stay in their communities and survive.

We hope you will join us in making this a reality! Please help us help the hungry and starving in the Horn of Africa. Make a donation today via our website here, by calling our offices at 415-346-4820, or by mailing a check to 2435 Polk Street, Suite 21, San Francisco, CA 94109. Please add the code FAM in the comments/memo section of your online donation or check.

With deepest thanks.

Sincerely,

Martin Fisher & Nick Moon
Co-Founders & Directors
KickStart International

P.S. As a start, we are working to raise $300,000 in the next few months. It’s urgent. Every $500 will enable us to install and manage a water pump in a drought stricken community. Every $25 will help one more person have enough to drink and eat to survive the drought - please help us today!

KickStart is Now on Twitter

2011-08-05T20:45:31Z