Rebuild Women's Hope: Idjwi Island First-Ever Maternity Clinic

Established by Marceline Budza in 2013 to empower the women of DRC through financial education and independence,Rebuild Women’s Hope (RWH) Coffee Cooperative produces high grade Arabica coffee on the beautiful rural Idjwi Island in Eastern DRC.

Determined to create a meaningful impact for the entire community in which they work, RWH identified the urgent need for a maternity and paediatric clinic on the south of the island, home to some 250, 000 people with no (at the time) medical provision. During a visit to the Island in Oct 2019, Marceline and Bertin (General Manager of RWH) discussed the plight of the local community with Grant (Mozzo’s founder) and Mozzo committed it’s C2C Fund™ contributions for 2020 and 2021 to building the clinic and operating it for 3 months.

Grant & Kim from Mozzo were honoured to attend the opening of the clinic in person on 15th Dec 2020, and since then around 14 staff have been treating on average 3-400 women, children and men a month for a range of vital medical needs including childbirth, postnatal care, infection treatment, cancer treatment, disease, malnutrition and injury.

Despite the devastating covid related loss in revenue Mozzo itself faced 2020-21, we increased funding the clinic operating costs to a full year in 2021, in response to the pandemic’s damaging effect on the coffee growing community.

Now, in 2022, the cooperative is able to realise the ultimate goal of self sufficiently funding the clinic and we are truly honoured and proud to have been a part of the journey, and one that continues to create such a profound and positive impact on the local Idjwi community.