A history of CHASE Africa

CHASE Africa began life as a tree planting charity. Our first partner was a local organisation that shared a desire to protect and conserve the Rift Valley’s beautiful, but shrinking, biodiversity in Kenya.

We spent 12 years involved with tree-planting, water harvesting and fuel-efficient stove projects. Over this time, we met many women who were having more children than they wanted due to a lack of access to modern contraceptives, trapping the family in a cycle of poverty.

It was very clear that there was a direct link between the unmet need for family planning and poverty. A need we decided to address, and CHASE Africa was born.

In 2012, the charity changed its name to Community Health and Sustainable Environment (CHASE) Africa and started working with one partner that was using mobile clinics to provide family planning and primary healthcare services in remote and marginalised areas of Kenya.

Over time, and with an increasing understanding of the needs of rural people, we began to encourage other organisations to add primary healthcare to their work, with a focus on sexual reproductive health, to help them meet many of their other objectives.

In recent years we have deliberately started new projects with conservation organisations as they are often the only organisations in remote rural areas who have the connections to local communities, alongside existing operational capacity to add a new area of work.

We still are involved with tree planting, fuel-efficient stoves and rainwater harvesting, but we understand that giving women the opportunity to have their children by choice, and not chance, has numerous benefits for them, the entire family and the long-term prosperity of the greater community.

From our first Kenyan partner, we have now supported fourteen local partners across Kenya and Uganda and we have started operating in Tanzania.