Kampala - Masaka
This morning we checked out of our Kampala hotel hit the road to head south to Masaka. After quite a bit of milling about in the lobby we loaded into the van for the journey, which went a little something like this:
Hour 1 - Traffic, honking, traffic, honking, an interesting market (more varieties of sweet potato than I've ever seen)...
Hour 2 - Road. Pothole, pothole, pothole. Road. A lot of greenery - the equator! We had a quaint little demonstration on the way water drains in each hemisphere, then on the actual equator. I also heard some good news that you weigh three per cent less when you stand on the equator. (So I must've looked pretty fit there for a minute.)
Hour 3 - Arrived at Oikocredit project partner CEDO's offices.
CEDO - the Community Enterprises Development Organization
The general aim of CEDO (very briefly) is to improve food security for vulnerable groups in four districts in southern Uganda. They work only with groups (rather than individuals) and provide most of their loans in the form of bean seeds, which are then repaid in seeds again. We spoke with Rosemary Mayiga (CEO), Charles Katabalwa (monitoring & evaluation officer) and John Kayabula (rights-based program officer).
The areas the NGO works in have a 12% rate of HIV/AIDS positive people - double the national rate. Apparently, during the 90s the area was a ghost town, with thousands killed by the disease. Many still believe it was witchcraft. Since 2008, CEDO has had a loan of 260,000 UGX (about 93,000 euros) over four years. I'll explain more how CEDO works as we meet some of its clients over the next two days.
We went to an empty little place for lunch (where I ate an entire Tilapia fish - that's him below, fresh from Lake Victoria). Charles from CEDO explained a little about the woman I was about to meet. A woman who cares for 13 children - six her own - because of the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Her and her husband's sisters and brothers have been lost to the disease and now she relies on her own agricultural projects to keep the household running.
Meet Margaret Nakibuule
She's a member of the Dduka Obwavu Grower's Cooperative Society, which translates to 'Run away from poverty'. Margaret has received bean seeds from CEDO's loan program and used the profit from the crop to buy a sewing machine for one of the orphans she cares for. She's also taken part in technical training from CEDO officers for agricultural and animal husbandry, hygiene, nutrition and general family health. Because of the health education, she says the rate of sickness in the family has gone down. The quality of her produce, maize, vegetables and beans, has also improved with some technical training from CEDO.
Cleverly, she has diversified her projects, engaging in poultry farming as well as agriculture and she hopes to further venture into goat and pig rearing. Margaret's husband, Vincent, is an artisan who makes cloth from the bark of trees which he sells for about 15,000 UGX each (around 5 euros). Not only can Margaret's ventures add to the household income, but the benefits are clear in other ways. Improved food production means Margaret can use some of the vegetables she grows to feed the family a balanced diet, rather than buying produce from elsewhere.
From her pristine garden to the 'Tippy-tap" (photos to come) there's no doubt Margaret is a smart, proactive and inspirational woman. "I have new energies, more perseverance, unlike in the past," she said. "I feel more empowered than I ever have been."
We crammed into the front room of her small brick house and she served us peanuts from her crop and fresh banana juice. It was incredible to meet a woman who cares for 13 children, has lost countless family and friends to HIV/AIDS and works like a machine... yet she couldn't stop smiling for us. We left, completely in awe of her.
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