MISSION
ZanaAfrica Foundation supports adolescent girls in Kenya to stay in school by delivering reproductive health education and sanitary pads.
VISION
We envision a world where girls in East Africa live healthy, safe, educated lives while defining their own purpose-a world in which menst… read morerual health management is recognized as a human right, and the onset of puberty as the most effective time to engage girls in a range of personal health decisions.
HISTORY
ZanaAfrica Foundation was founded in 2007 by Megan White Mukuria an Ashoka fellow (’15) and a graduate of Harvard University (’99), who while working with Kenyan street children in 2001, learned that sanitary pads were out of reach for 65% of girls, causing them to not only miss 6 weeks of school each year, but to drop out of school all together at twice the rate of boys.
The urgency of this issue led her to start ZanaAfrica Foundation so that girls could access the tools they desperately need in order to stay in school and unlock their potential. To support girls across their lifetime, in 2008 Megan and her business partner Lawino Kagumba founded ZanaAfrica Group as a social enterprise to change the marketplace for girls. ZanaAfrica Group’s product designers innovate high quality sanitary products that support girls and women to be healthy, informed, and boldly live their purpose.
Megan is a recognized leader in menstrual health and hygiene management who brings fourteen years of senior-level leadership experience with nonprofits focused on women, girls, and communities. She currently lives and works in Nairobi, Kenya – a place she has called home for the past fifteen years.