Recent reports revealed that of the estimated 17-million children in school in South Africa, 11-million of them walk to school every day. Nearly 500,000 of these learners walk more than an hour or up to 6km one way. The high rate of school dropouts in rural communities especially of girls has been partly attributed to the walking distance endured by the learners. The girls' plight is also exacerbated by an extra burden of morning household chores which increases tardiness and exhaustion.
BEEP - which was started in 2009 in Zambia by World Bicycle Relief - found bicycles as a safe, reliable and affordable mode of transportation for the learners. Qhubeka in partnership with World Vision South Africa introduced BEEP in South Africa in 2013 and to date 8,100 bicycles have been delivered in five provinces.
"Education is one of our key pillars in our quest to be a company with meaning and impact through our corporate social investment initiatives under the banner of Volkswagen for Good. As the maker of people's car, we are passionate about South Africa. This drives us to working towards making a sustainable difference in the fight against poverty and community upliftment," said Thomas Schaefer, MD: Volkswagen Group South Africa.
"Through our partnership with Qhubeka and World Vision South Africa, we seek to make a small difference but with big impact on the lives of young boys and girls in the most rural parts of our country. We are very hopeful that these bicycles will change the learners' approach to their schooling and encourage them to work harder to be the best that they want to be," Schaefer added.
Qhubeka Executive Director, Sarah Phaweni said, "Qhubeka is delighted to be partnering with Volkswagen to provide access to education through bicycles to children in South Africa. Thanks to Volkswagen's generous donation distance no longer needs to be a barrier to education for 1,100 school children in Nkonkobe and Umzimkhulu. Research shows that education is an essential element in the fight to end the cycle of poverty in developing countries. With BEEP we can make an immediate difference to school attendance as well as improve children's wellbeing with reliable and affordable transportation."
Paula Barnard, National Director of World Vision SA, said, "With BEEP 2015 well underway we're undoubtedly meeting what we set out to achieve, reaching the most rural of communities to enable these children to attend school on time and so improve their overall educational outcomes."
Each benefiting learner receives a bicycle with a helmet, spanner, combination lock and pump. The learner and parents or guardian are required to sign a contract which stipulates the terms and conditions of using the bicycle. A Bicycle Supervisory Committee is also set up at each recipient school and represented by teachers, SGB (student governing body) members and parents. The committee's role is to not only select beneficiaries but also enforce the two-year service-to-own contract which governs the use of the bicycle.
The bicycle becomes the personal property of the learner after the two years of the contract have elapsed.
Volkswagen is one of the largest donors of the BEEP programme. The cost of one bicycle is R2,320. It covers amongst other things component manufacturing, delivery, helmet, training of the field mechanic, as well as ADP's monitoring and evaluation programme.
