Malawian Healthcare Set To Receive Local Support

Here's to good health and charity in 2018! Recently working with Malawian craftsmen to design and develop a collection of affordable hospital equipment that is to be manufactured locally, Dutch design studio Super Local's intent is certainly refreshing.

Aptly named 'Care Collection', Super Local is introducing hospital beds, surgical tables, theatre stools, trolleys, room segment dividers, drip stands, laundry trolleys and over-bed dining tables. A sour situation currently exists in Malawi in that the landlocked country has to import all the hospital equipment that they need, but due to expensive imports, have to often make-do with their run-down alternatives, compromising on a day to day basis. With the brief of this project entirely focussed on this problem, Super Local is certainly set to make a difference. Supposing that the import costs from South Africa are similar to that of a freight ship all the way from China, the scale of the import costs can be appreciated. Equally too, even with new equipment, a regular issue is that there are no local tooling or mechanics to fix each item and therefore they become as redundant as if they didn't even exist.

In collaboration with the craftsmen at the company Sakaramenta, a Blantyre-based workshop that produces sustainable products such as play equipment and bicycles, Super Local has been able to fulfil this project with pride. Designed to use as little components and be as simple as possible, this collection uses new products rather than recycled; that said, this is okay given their sour situation and the improvements that this will make. SATORI & SCOUT reckon that being manufactured locally will be the real crux of this project's success. Discover more about the designers' other work at: Super-Local.org