A single mother rises above disaster in the Nairobi settlements

Humanitarian: Ruth Njeri and her daughter Sharon invited three displaced families to share their one-room apartment during recent floods

When I last met Ruth Njeri, she was striding down the main street in Huruma, one of Nairobi’s notoriously crowded settlements, beaming at neighbors and extolling the virtues of this bewildering place.

We had spent much of the day in a claustrophobic one-room apartment, high in a tenement building, where Ruth lives with her three children. Ruth showed off her worms, which were munching through food scraps in her composting bins, and proudly displayed an exuberant bag that she had made recently.

Ruth’s daughter Sharon explained the basics of sign language, which she is studying at college because she wants to work with the deaf. Sharon, who has albinism, explained to me (rather pointedly, but with a grin) that the sign for an old man is a beard.

We then accompanied Ruth to a tiny scrap of wasteland some distance from her home that she planned to turn into a kitchen garden with help from Stella Makena, a close friend who introduced her to composting. Stella coordinates Shield of Faith, an association of mainly single mothers who also compost, and served as my guide during a journey through the settlements.

We put out a video on my visit earlier this year. When I wrote to Ruth that she had emerged as the star she was surprised but hopeful that she might inspire others who were down on their luck. She wrote again on World Albinism Day (June 13) to say that we could use photos of her two children with albinism. A week later she wrote to wish me Happy Father’s Day (June 16).

*

Last year was also a breakout year for the Shield of Faith composting experiment. As we noted in a recent bulletin, twenty members of the group composted almost four tons of organic waste during the year. Twelve also grew fruit and vegetables in makeshift kitchen gardens ranging from sukuma wiki (a local favorite related to collard greens) to strawberries.

Shield of Faith showed in 2023 that composting and gardening can be deeply empowering for single women who live in a crowded, polluted urban environment. This year, with the wind in their sails, the composters decided it was time to take their model into the community.

They planned to do this in two ways. First, they would turn their gardens into composting “hubs” and compost organic waste from local vendors who sell food on the streets. Second, they would introduce composting and gardening to government schools, which offer free meals to underprivileged children in the slums and in the process create a lot of organic waste.

This compelling vision won Shield of Faith a generous donation from the Foundation for Systemic Change and over $1,400 through a GlobalGiving appeal. We recruited a talented Peace Fellow from George Washington University to help Stella review her experiment and work on social media.

*

Then, in April, came disaster.

Nairobi was struck by fierce storms which caused massive flooding in the settlements. Thousands of families that had erected flimsy houses along river banks suddenly found themselves without a home.

Undaunted, Ruth offered her apartment to three families that had lost everything in the floods and within days sixteen people of all ages were crammed into her single room. The children, including a two-year old, slept in the big “double-decker” bed that Ruth had purchased with money earned from selling embroidery through our online store. Everyone else slept on mattresses.

“I used to sleep on the streets with no one to turn to,” wrote Ruth in a WhatsApp message. “It’s my aspiration that people may learn about sharing, however small or little they have.”

Ruth appealed to friends and The Advocacy Project donated $250 to help with food. All schools were closed during the crisis, which made the children even more antsy and added to the stress. But they managed somehow and after two months the three families found new housing.

Disaster struck again on June 24 when violent protests erupted in downtown Nairobi. Some settlements, including Huruma where Ruth lives, were relatively unscathed. But several Shield of Faith composters in the settlements of Kangemi and Githurai found themselves under siege. Kangemi remains tense to this day.

*

The July riots – unexpected and savage – made it difficult for Stella to visit her team for weeks. They also forced us to recall our Peace Fellow.

It was a reverse, for sure, but we had reckoned without the indomitable Ruth. Throughout this summer of disasters, Stella and Ruth had been quietly erecting a kitchen garden on the plot of wasteland that we visited last year. By the time of the floods, the garden was a riot of thick green vegetables that helped to feed Ruth’s displaced lodgers.

Not content with launching her own urban shamba, Ruth then opened a small shop in the heart of Huruma. She borrowed 20,000 shillings ($154) interest free from a friend and also took out a loan of $62 through a savings plan started by Stella for Shield of Faith members. Ruth knew it was a gamble because she has no business experience. But as she told Stella during a recent visit, she particularly likes interacting with kids and is always keen to learn.

Ruth’s original intention had been to open a general purpose store that deals in exchanged goods (such as used clothing) and is known in Kenya as a malimali shop. She purchased some basic products which didn’t sell as well as she had hoped, so she began offering a cooked breakfast of sweet potatoes. These were soon selling like hot cakes, so she added evening meals of maize and beans (a popular local dish known as githeri).

Ruth keeps up a grueling pace. She gets up at 5 am every morning, heads off to her store to start cooking, goes home to help her children start their day, and then returns to sell her cooked potatoes. Miraculously, nothing gets stolen in the meantime. Ruth rarely gets home before 10 at night. It’s exhausting but she is – as always – enthusiastic at launching what she calls her “second career.”

While savoring her new role as an entrepreneur, Ruth also remains aware of her responsibilities as a composter. She has started to collect vegetable remains from another vendor across the road and also picks up waste from street sellers on her way home. Most is composted at her shamba. The rest is fed to her worms at home.

But Ruth is also deliberately vague if vendors ask how she plans to use their waste. As she explained to Stella, they will start charging money if they know it has value.

It is too soon to tell if this important insight will slow the development of composting hubs but it will certainly help Stella with planning in 2025.

*

With Ruth and Stella showing the way, Shield of Faith appears to have weathered the summer storms. Between January and June of this year, twenty members composted a combined 2.56 tons of foods waste – more than the 2.01 tons composted during the same period last year.

Six composters with kitchen gardens, like Ruth, are helping neighbors to dispose of their waste in some form or another (the first baby steps towards a hub) and thus making small inroads into the mountains of garbage that litter the settlements. Twelve members are growing vegetables.

Stella and her team have also helped a large girls’ secondary school (Our Lady of Mercy) to expand composting and gardening. This, too, is in its early stages but could open the way to partnerships with more schools. As with individual vendors, Stella hopes that motivated students will encourage their parents to compost, thus helping to change behavior in neighborhoods.

Inevitably there are challenges. Three gardeners were forced to move their gardens after their landlords reneged on promises – further proof that life in the settlements is precarious.

But the urge to innovate is driving this experiment and each setback is met with more determination. If tenacity is anything to go by, Stella, Ruth and their composting friends will remain a sound investment for a long time to come – as well as a reminder to us to get our own priorities straight.

Businesswoman: Ruth in her malimali shop in the Huruma settlement