Students from the Mathare community in Kenya are set to receive a film or photography scholarship from Canon Central and North Africa (CCNA) [www.Canon-CNA.com] as part of a social media campaign raising awareness to the importance of skills development among young people.

The project is part of Canon’s Miraisha Programme, an initiative focused on delivering job opportunities and future livelihoods to young people across Africa through skills workshops, training programmes and enterprise support. Since its launch in 2014, the programme has educated more than 5,680+ future professionals across the continent, helping them to gain qualifications, secure employment and set up their own businesses.

In order to celebrate the success of the Miraisha Programme to date, CCNA will be offering scholarships for the KCA University to students from the Mathare community. The scholarships will enable the young people to develop their visual storytelling skills, opening opportunities for them to improve their own lives and the community around them.

To raise awareness of the importance of this initiative, CCNA will also release a series of videos showcasing the Miraisha Programme in action in the Mathare community. Supported by influencers across the region, CCNA aims to share these videos as widely as possible to educate and inspire others on the power of visual storytelling as a tool for personal and community development. You can watch the full story & share from @CanonCNA (https://bit.ly/3q36miZ) social channels.

Mathare is one of the most deprived urban areas in Africa, with young people suffering from a lack of employment prospects. The videos highlight how Canon Miraisha worked with the Mathare Community Training Programme to deliver training workshops to a number of young people in the area. These taught them a range of photography and filmmaking skills to help improve their opportunities. We have created a train the trainer programme which invests in training local trainers in country to be able to teach, share knowledge and skillsets with fellow photographers/ filmmakers and the next generation. 15 local people are now employed as Canon Miraisha Trainers as a result of the programme.

The campaign will run for 10 weeks, and for every 10,000 engagement of the video on social media, CCNA will reveal one of the scholarship recipients, showcasing their personal story, background and hopes for the future.

Somesh Adukia, Managing Director at Canon Central and North Africa Sales, said, “Canon is committed to empowering youth in the African region through the development of vocational skills in imaging. This is best demonstrated through the continued successes of the Miraisha programme which actively empowers youth with skill that are practical, marketable and sustainable. We believe the powerful stories that will come from the project are best driven by the creative talent developed from the communities being featured. We also look forward to rolling out this initiative across the region in the coming months.”

Since 2016, the Miraisha Programme has worked with a wide range of organisations across Africa, including Kenyatta University, Kenya Film Commission (KFC), Kenya Photography Awards, Yabba College of Technology in Nigeria, Uganda Press Photo Award (UPPA), The NRB Bus, and PEFTI Film institute in Nigeria amongst many other organisations or events. For more details on the programme please visit the website (https://bit.ly/3tKTcJF).