When bike-sharing firms oBike, Ofo and Mobike pulled out of Singapore and Malaysia, they left behind thousands of perfectly-usable bikes in “graveyards“.
Tech investor Mike Than Tun Win saw it as an opportunity to improve the lives of children in his home country of Myanmar. Buying up 10,000 bikes earlier this year, he shipped them home to be handed out to children, in hopes of giving them easier access to education.
One of the first 200 children to benefit from the scheme – called Lesswalk – was Thae Su Wai, who will no longer need to trudge 10km for two hours to and from lessons, she told AFP.
“I’ll have more time to study and play with friends,” the 11-year-old said, as she excitedly wheeled away her new bicycle at Nhaw Kone Village school near Yangon.
Mike grew up and was educated in Singapore before returning home eight years ago with a business degree.
“I saw students walking for many hours to get to school and I felt really sorry for them,” the 33-year-old said.
UNICEF estimates 55 per cent of children in Myanmar live in poverty, while half of 17-year-olds enter adulthood with little or no education.
Mike says this is just the start – the aim is to keep up the momentum and hand out a total of 100,000 bikes over five years.
“They might not be worth anything in Singapore, but they’re valuable in a poorer country,” he said.
