Kenya Poverty Elimination Network
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Mission Statement
Kenya Poverty Elimination Network (K-PEN) is a national non-governmental organization founded and registered in Kenya in the year 2000, primarily to challenge poverty at the community level, with special emphasis on women and youth living in rural districts of Kenya. The organization was started by a group of women involved in community and women’s empowerment activities who felt that more women and youth were being marginalized with each passing day, with economic enhancements opportunities getting scarcer and employment and credit opportunities gradually becoming limited in our country. VISION K-PEN works towards realization of a well-endowed society where citizens live in dignity and prosperity. MISSION: K-PEN is established to develop and provide suitable, sustainable and comprehensive livelihoods opportunities for the marginalized members of the community, with special emphasis on women and youth, to improve their income capacities, quality of lives and enable them live in dignity.
About This Cause
Project History: Kenya Poverty Elimination Network (KPEN) is a national non-governmental organization founded and registered in Kenya in the year 2000, primarily to challenge poverty at the community level, with special emphasis on women and youth living in urban slums and rural districts of Kenya. The organization was started by a group of women involved in community and women’s empowerment activities who felt that more women and youth were being marginalized with each passing day, with economic enhancements opportunities getting scarcer and employment and credit opportunities gradually becoming limited in our country. KPEN seeks to enhance its presence in 3 main counties of Nairobi, Migori and Homa Bay. Apart from Nairobi, Homa Bay and Migori counties are some of the poorest counties in Kenya, with latest poverty index putting the two counties as some of the poorest, where up to 50% of families live below poverty line and unemployment rates as high as 70% of the local population. Local cultures in these two counties equally exacerbate poverty trends, where women are marginalized and excluded from many economic enhancement opportunities such as land ownership and access to credit facilities. Homa Bay and Migori counties depend on small business enterprises, small scale agriculture, animal husbandry and fishing for livelihoods. They have also shouldered the heaviest burdens of HIV and AIDS epidemic, with families losing their productive members to AIDS complications, leaving behind children with little opportunities for schooling and decent living and older grandparents to take over the care roles at family levels. Homa Bay and Migori counties are predominantly rural, with inadequate infrastructure and service delivery in terms of health and livelihoods and low life expectancy. Formation of K-PEN in 1998 and its ultimate registration as a National Non-governmental organization in 2000 was a response to this scenario, which was compounded by the findings of many different household surveys (KDHS) which confirmed that poverty levels were higher in these two areas than in many other parts of Nyanza province. The Kenya Demographic and health survey (KDHS) of 1998 revealed a sorry picture of poverty in Homa Bay and Migori Districts, portraying them as havens of poverty where life expectancy stood at 48 years, with older people being left in droves by HIV and AIDS to care for an increasing numbers of orphans. A few women Professionals in the field of community development in Kenya considered that a special vehicle was needed to bridge and deliver on this huge gap. K-PEN was therefore formed. MAIN OBJECTIVE The main objective (GOAL) of K-PEN is to develop and provide suitable, sustainable and comprehensive livelihoods opportunities for the marginalized members of the community, with special emphasis on women and youth, to improve their income capacities, quality of lives and so eliminate poverty from the communities where it works. WHY THE FOCUS ON POVERTY ELIMINATION Poverty is the state of lack in certain amount of material possessions or money. Absolute poverty or destitution refers to the lack basic human needs, which commonly includes clean and fresh water, nutrition, healthcare, education, clothing and shelter. Globally, about 1.7 billion people are estimated to live in absolute poverty today while about 3 billion are classified as living in poverty. Relative poverty refers to lacking a usual or socially acceptable level of resources or income as compared with others within a society or country. For the better part of history of mankind, poverty had been mostly accepted as inevitable as traditional modes of production were insufficient to give an entire population a comfortable standard of living. Today, poverty reduction and elimination are a major goal and issue for many local and international organizations such as the United Nations and the World Bank. Poverty is therefore the state for the majority of the world’s people and nations. A 2005 report by the United Nations ranked Kenya as 154th out of a list of 177 countries, in terms of life expectancy, literacy levels and overall gross domestic product. Just three years earlier, the country had ranked 134th. For comparison, Uganda was ranked at 144th, and Tanzania was 164th. Both are immediate neighbors of Kenya. There are several factors contributing to the ongoing problem of poverty in Kenya, though the issue of Kenya's economic state is far more complex than a simple list of causes. It is widely held for example that unequal distribution of economic enhancement opportunities by the state has resulted in certain areas being perennially poor while others are permanently well endowed. Other causes of poverty include poor cultural practices and socialization, gender discrimination and natural circumstances such as deserts, land terrain and climatic conditions. It is widely acknowledged now (cf: Actionaid on poverty in Kenya) that poverty must be at the core of the development debate in any organization worth its status. Actionaid, a leading international organization involved in poverty eradication believes that absolute poverty is a denial of basic human rights and should be eradicated. The approach is to work with poor and marginalized people to overcome the injustice and inequity that causes absolute poverty. In Actionaid, targeting is understood to mean the deliberate bias towards certain groups in society that suffer exclusion and marginalization e.g. the poorest of the poor, women and girls. Targeting is important because it provides a basis for priority setting in its poverty eradication programmes and performance measurement. K-PEN believes that poverty robs people of their human dignity and like Actionaid, asserts that it is not enough just to talk about it- more must be done to eliminate. K-PEN thus takes up its role in fighting poverty, which is considered a vice to social order, an anathema and an anti-people scourge. Fighting poverty is the only way to develop a community, a people, a nation and a society. There is no other way of improving human dignity and quality of lives other than fight poverty and its co-factors. K-PEN STRATEGIC OBJECTIVES K-PEN is being guided by the following lower-level strategic objectives: 1. To provide opportunities for economic enhancements for marginalized people in society, with special focus on women and youth for more wholesome and dignified living. 2. To improve knowledge in the community that challenges social and cultural stereotypes, practices and inclinations that deprive and insubordinate women, girls and other disadvantaged members of the society in order to bring out equity and prosperity. 3. To develop and implement community interventions which reduce HIV incidences and improve quality of lives for persons and families living with and affected by HIV and AIDS as a way of poverty elimination. 4. To promote civic and human rights awareness, participation and involvement among women and youth as a way of fighting poverty at the community level. 5. To cooperate with other relevant civil society organizations and departments of the Kenyan Government in addressing the challenges of poverty, HIV and AIDS and civic participation among the affected populations in urban slums and rural districts of Kenya and in furtherance of the objectives of the organization. 6. To raise, mobilize and disburse financial and material resources for the promotion of the objectives of K-PEN as an organization. 7. To strengthen K-PEN’s organization capacity to effectively and efficiently deliver services to its clientele. KPEN VISION K-PEN works towards realization of a well-endowed society where citizens live in dignity and prosperity. K-PEN MISSION: Kenya poverty Elimination Network (K-PEN) is established to develop and provide suitable, sustainable and comprehensive livelihoods opportunities for the marginalized members of the community, with special emphasis on women and youth, to improve their income capacities, quality of lives and enable them live in dignity and prosperity. This mission is accomplished through broad strategies of providing livelihood opportunities for women, youth and other disadvantaged people in the community, challenging negative cultural and social practices, stereotypes, retrogressive national and local policies, enhancing civic and citizens civic participation in the political and democratic processes of the country, promoting ethnic harmony and co-existence and the fight against HIV and AIDS while collaborating with other related organizations. K-PEN CORE VALUES K-PEN is guided in its program work by the following values: Confidentiality in engaging with our clients Quality service delivery to our clients at all times Teamwork in order to meet our objectives in a cost effective way Prompt attention to clients needs (the interests and needs of our clients come first) Compassion shown to our clients while serving them Gender sensitivity in program design and management Integrity and ethical practices to enhance all the above values. KPEN MANAGEMENT Kenya poverty Eradication network (KPEN) is a membership organization, where people who receive services, those who register to be its members and those who opt to support its course have the opportunity to become its members. Once every year, these members converge as an annual general meeting (AGM) to review its progress and refocus the organization for the future. The annual general meeting (AGM) is therefore the highest decision-making body for KPEN. It elects the Board of Directors for a period of three years subject to KPEN constitution. The Board of Directors is then tasked with matters of policy, supervision and overall support to the implementation and management of the organization. The Board, which meets 4 times each year (Quarterly) on routine, also serves as an advocacy arm of the organization and is its voice to the external environment, mainly through the Chairperson and the Program Director.