Bringing accessibility to VI students in Tanzania, with Close The Gap

Published: 21 November 2017 11:03

Close Close the Gap - Bridging the Digital Divide The Gap is a not for profit organisation which distributes pre-owned computers donated by large and medium-sized corporations or public organisations to educational, medical, entrepreneurial and social projects in developing and emerging countries.

Close The Gap collects decommissioned computers from companies and arranges for other organisations to clean the hard disks and then check and configure the hardware according to the requirements of its end-users. The computers are then shipped to the destination country by sea or air transport. Since 2003, Close the Gap has already received more than 600,000 computers from companies all over Europe and, today, Close the Gap has supported more than 4,900 projects all over the world.

Chairman of Close The Gap, Wim Blonk, told us:

"We are receiving the computers from big companies. We are sending them to Arrow, which is the largest logistical part of electronics worldwide, and we are partnered with them. They are data-wiping the computers for us...and they are adding, on our request, a new keyboard and new sound system, and also legal software. And these computers are then put in stock and they are then made available to projects in African countries mainly, but we have also been able to export computers to Latin America and to Asia."

We were thrilled to be able to help them on a project in Tanzania, by supplying some SuperNova licences for visaully impaired children at a school in Moshi.

Wim commented:

"SuperNova’s a beautiful and most valuable tool giving young disabled persons at the bottom of the pyramid the chance to prepare for a decent and worthy future. It allows them also to take care of themselves without being dependant on others."

Find out more in our video.