This backpack was trash. Now it’s a life-saving schoolbag for kids

For Thato Kgatlhanye, this was all too familiar. She saw it every day in her hometown of Rustenburg, a mining community in the North West province of South Africa.

So the young entrepreneur decided to do something about it.

“This is our home. The reason we started this business is we looked at our community and we wanted to do work that matters,” explains Kgatlhanye.

That work turned into Repurpose Schoolbags — the first green initiative from Rethaka, a social startup Kgatlhanye co-founded alongside childhood friend-turned-business partner Rea Ngwane.

Photographs provided by Miora Rajaonary for Emerging Innovation, a new magazine of creative ideas and management practices in the Global South.

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