Providing a second chance

Specialist charity Computer Aid International has just shipped its 100,000th refurbished PC to Africa. The organisation has been sending donated PCs to recipients, including schoolchildren and medical staff, for more than three years.

But refurbished PCs for organisations that could not otherwise afford computer equipment is at the end of the cycle. At the beginning is a donor organisation with legacy equipment to dispose of.

Most of the donated computers go through a standard refurbishment process. But some of the software installed can vary depending on whether the computers are destined for blind or visually impaired people, which might need greater memory or audio, for example.

Recipients are given a choice of receiving pre-installed software or not, says Computer Aid chief executive Tony Roberts.

Most of the PCs are shipped with a Microsoft operating system, as the charity is an authorised refurbishing scheme member.

Computer Aid has the Microsoft Windows master discs to install the operating system for which it pays $3.50 (£1.69) per computer.

But quite often people opt for no software because they have their own licensing arrangement with local vendors.

“One of our projects in Kenya has an agreement with Microsoft East Africa, for instance, where they have the option to use the full range of Microsoft software, whereas we are only licensing for the operating system,” says Roberts.

And on very rare occasions people choose to receive PCs with open source software, he says.

An organisation that decides to donate equipment to Computer Aid also receives the services of a commercial decommissioning company free of charge.

Data-wiping a PC is the most important part of the process for corporate donors, says Roberts.

Computer Aid wipes data from donated computers using a data-destruction product called Blancco.

“It was the first product approved by the US Department of Defense and the UK secret service,” says Roberts.

Blancco uses a multiple overwrite process which does not simply reformat or delete data, but overwrites it multiple times until the data is completely unrecoverable.

Computer Aid has had a partnership with Blancco for a number of years as part of the data-wiping firm’s corporate social responsibility programme.

“We are a beta testing site for Blancco so when more advanced data destruction algorithms are introduced we are at the leading edge,” says Roberts.

Advanced technology processes are not something one would usually associate with a charity, so the organisation is keen to communicate its high level of technical expertise and professionalism.

“When people engage with us they discover the level of services we offer, with professional staff and the world’s leading data destruction solution,” says Roberts.

And the service also covers the equipment that is not used because it is either defective or below the minimum specifications.

Computer Aid has a responsibility to make sure the computers it cannot reuse are disposed of responsibly, says Roberts.

“We ensure it never leaves the European Union and is treated by a licensed waste management company to the highest environmental standards, ensuring zero per cent goes to landfill and all plastic and metal is reused,” he says.

Although Computer Aid covers the cost of the disposal, it tries to balance the small amount of income made from recovering precious metals in electronic circuitry with the cost of decommissioning the cathode ray tube monitors.

The cathode disposal is without doubt the most expensive, difficult and hazardous part of decommissioning, says Roberts.

The cost fluctuates depending on the commodity price of the copper and smaller amounts of gold, silver and palladium in electronic circuitry.

So far the figures add up and the system works to the benefit of the thousands of recipients who have had their lives improved by access to technology they would otherwise never have used.

Last year Computer Aid shipped 23,000 PCs. Roberts hopes next year will be a bumper year and aims to ship 30,000 PCs to more than 100 developing countries.

“We supply organisations that could never afford to buy computers commercially,” he says.

And now the UK market is saturated, every corporate computer will be replaced in a two-to-three-year cycle.

That means an assured supply of equipment for an organisation whose reach continues to grow throughout the developing world.

To support Computing’s fundraising appeal for a Computer Aid telemedicine project in Africa, visit:
www.justgiving.com/computingcuba

Conforming to WEEE

When the European Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) directive came into effect in July this year, it changed the legal framework within which Computer Aid International operated.

The charity works closely with the Environment Agency (EA), which awarded the charity the status of approved authorised treatment facility (AATF).

Computer Aid was the first international charity to receive such status and all companies now have a legal responsibility to make sure they dispose of WEEE through an AATF.

Computer Aid has been through a process of upgrading and professionalising all its services to meet the
requirements of the new legislation.

The charity uses a proprietary asset-tracking system so donor firms have a clear audit trail of the equipment they donate.

The system makes businesses’ WEEE reporting much easier, as they are required to ensure they have a compliant end-of-life process for their equipment, by either going back to the manufacturer from which they bought the equipment or through an organisation such as Computer Aid.

The EA reporting systems do not yet encompass business reuse and recycling, even though domestic WEEE is being tracked. But a quarterly returns system for business waste is likely to start very soon, says Computer Aid operations director Sonia Sinanan.

“Our database is collecting all asset-tracking information for our internal purposes, but we do not have to return to the EA yet,” she said.

The system tracks the equipment from the point at which it leaves the donor’s premises, right through the refurbishment process until it reaches the recipient organisation.

A clear audit trail means donors can track the equipment throughout the process.

“The donor organisation can request audit information from any part of the whole process,” says Sinanan.

The organisation currently reports all donated assets to the EA regardless of whether they are refurbished, reused or disposed of.

Being ahead of the game with asset tracking ensures the organisation is ready for any future requirements.

“The benefit for donors is that they now know that today or tomorrow we are WEEE-compliant,” says Sinanan.

“The law says businesses have to be responsible for their end-of-life equipment and what we have done is enable businesses to know exactly what has been done with it.”

Computer Aid’s service removes the burden of legal compliance issues and disposal, and the question of how to put legacy equipment to good use.

“Our asset-tracking system states what has been used, tracked, refurbished and redelivered,” says Sinanan.