The MRDP is very fortunate to have been able to get this agreement with Qhubeka to assemble their Buffalo bicycles [thx Collin!]. The Quiet Living CC landowners all agreed that the MRDP should take this opportunity and put up an assembly plant on their land [for which the MRDP then pays towards their Landbank debts] and create employment opportunities for the community. This project started in October 2013 and since then ca 25 Batswana men and women are employed, whenever there are bicycles to be assembled. Per year thousands of bicycles are assembled here. This project also involves considerable skills transfer [technical and management] to Batswana that formerly only worked in agriculture.
Through this intervention 74 Buffalo bicycles could be placed in Letlhakane village for the learners to access their school in Pella, about 10km away on the other side of the hill.
The former volunteers/friends of the MRDP were pivotal for this project to be able to start, since they donated money to help to erect an assembly plant [a million thanks, guys!]. Quiet Living CC assisted with making land available, but as landowners they did not have the financial capacity to contribute to the assembly plant. This project again illustrates the advantage which the MRDP constellation offer to the Madikwe region, namely a synergy between different worlds and cultures that enriches/strengthens everyone mutually.