Cerebral Palsy and Assistive Cardboard Equipment: A New Green Social Enterprise

How about a new volunteer challenge for the New Year?

Want to be in at the start of a really new and different project?

Would you like to meet creative and enterprising new people locally?

Have you got skills and a little spare time to share?

Want some fun doing something practical, exciting and very GREEN?

And all of this in a really great cause too!.....

Join Paper Furniture Enterprises - A not-for-profit social enterprise!

Our aim is to set up a new social enterprise making furniture from recycled paper and card developing the work of Jean and Kennett Westmacott. They have been using paper furniture techniques, developed in Zimbabwe, by Bevill Packer and Timothy Gono to make specially adapted chairs, standing frames, ride-on animals and wheel chair inserts for severely disabled children in various parts of Africa - see http://www.peoplepotential.org.uk/ and http://www.cerebralpalsyafrica.org/

We want to see if we can learn the lessons of running a small social business first hand to help fund more workshops in Africa and India as well as the production of instruction manuals. We will do this by setting up Paper Furniture Enterprises (PFE) – a mini 'factory' to pilot larger scale production of customized paper furniture. We aim to record the pilot process as we go, learning by doing, so we can pass on our expertise and create a model for sustainable income generation for disability projects across the developing world.

Open Day - Monday 18th January

Plum Cottage, Hattingley Rd, Medstead, GU34 5NQ

Drop in anytime from 10am to 5pm - refreshments will be provided.

You are warmly invited to come and see photographs of Jean and Kennett's work in Africa, to have a chat about getting involved in this new social enterprise and to wish Happy 20th Birthday to the paper furniture sofa!

You can try it out too!

PFE want to build on Jean and Kennett's work to help the projects they have been working with become more self sufficient in their funding so that they can continue to provide the support and equipment these children so desperately need - see www.cerebralpalsyafrica.org. Jean is creating a manual of the construction techniques and we would like to add a 'how to' guide to income generation and running a small business from our experiences at the Medstead 'factory'. We want to involve as many local people and partners as we can. We are especially keen to work with young people in the village and local community. So please spread the word, pass on contacts of anyone who might be interested and get involved yourself!