Crystal Watley Kigoni is dedicated to the use of information and communications technologies for personal and community development.
She began her work in this area in 2007 with the Kenyan subsidiary of Intersat, a leading provider of satellite-based data solutions in Africa offering Internet via Satellite. Later, she founded and directed Voices of Africa for Sustainable Development through Information Empowerment that has implemented small innovative projects in Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda.
Voices of Africa worked in many of the low-income communities including rural Tanzania, Mwanza, Arusha, and Dar es Salaam also in Kenya she frequented Nairobi, Mombasa and the Dadaab Somali refugee camp. Crystal has shifted the focus of Voices of Africa to Dar es Salaam where she is working primarily with 3D printing of medical tools as a youth driven sustainable enterprise.
Nora Toure: Crystal, could you let us know about your background and what brought you into 3D printing in the first place?
Crystal Watley Kigoni: I was born in St. Petersburg, Florida and spent the first 13 years of my life there. I then moved to Asheville, NC where I stayed until I moved to New Orleans to do my Master’s in public health. During grad school, I first started traveling to East Africa. I moved to Kenya in 2006 and have been working on using technology for development through Voices of Africa and consulting services since.
