Our Partnership with Common Ground for Africa

Only a small fraction of girls and women in Kenya use sanitary products during menstruation. Most make do with newspapers, leaves, pieces of cloth, cow dung, and other materials, which cause chafing, urinary tract infections, reproductive tract infections, and other reproductive health problems, including fatal toxic shock syndrome and infertility. Lack of sanitary products also causes girls to stay home from school and women to miss work. The need and market for feminine hygiene products are huge. The challenge is to make products affordable and train women and girls on how to use them.

One Day’s Wages partnered with Common Ground for Africa (CGA) to construct a sanitary pad factory at Lenana Girls High School in Kitale, Kenya.  The factory was equipped with machinery and materials for production, and employed 8 woman.  In addition, 100 students were trained to produce and distribute affordable ‘Nalena’ menstrual pads.  The school developed a process that transforms sugar cane waste into an absorbent core for sanitary pads without the need for any chemicals or super absorbent polymers. This readily available agro-waste allows Nalena pads to be priced lower than other multinational brands. In this way, the project turned waste into a useable product.  The women and girls who participated in the project learned many practical business skills including product design, raw material collection and processing, production, branding, and marketing.