With 11 million of SA’s 17 million school children still walking to school, taking some of them up to four hours a day to travel to and from school, the need for transport is palpable.
Over the past three years, Volkswagen in partnership with Qhubeka have donated almost 3 000 Blue Bikes to children across South Africa to give them the priceless gift of time. Volkswagen believes that less time traveling to school means more time to learn, more time to play, more time with family and simply, and probably most powerful, the time to just be a child.
This year Volkswagen, together with Qhubeka, have committed once more to help mobilise the youth for a better future and have committed to distributing a total of 1 100 bicycles in 2017.
The project was brought to Gauteng, where 98 bicycles were donated to children at Kwa-Bhekilanga Secondary School and East Bank High School, health workers and community policing forum (CPF) volunteers. The bicycles have been funded through a Rand-for-Rand matching mechanism whereby City of Johannesburg has matched the funds raised by Volkswagen South Africa.
“Volkswagen’s vision is to provide sustainable mobility for Africa by way of German engineering and this programme fits in with that philosophy and shows our human side,” said Thomas Schaefer, Chairman and Managing Director of Volkswagen Group South Africa.
“We also hope that through having been beneficiaries of a bicycle, that this will leave a lasting impression in the minds of a handful of young South Africans and hopefully inspire more to dream big,” added Schaefer.
The project will roll out across the year and can be supported by visiting Qhubeka’s donation page here.
To watch the story of one of the bike handovers from 2016 below.
Source: Volkswagen