Tag: piggery

Single Mother of 12 is Assisted

Nakatereke Paulina is a single mother aged over 50 and resident of Nakateete Village, Nakateete Parish, Kisekka sub-county in Lwengo District. She is the household head of a family with seven children and five grandchildren, including OVC.

The household’s economic, health and social status is low, which prompted Kyamaganda Community Development Organization to enroll the household in OVC Program in October 2019 with the goal to improve their economic, health and social status.

According to the household assessment that was conducted in October 2019, the household was found in a critical state with no income-generating activities, poor hygiene, nutrition and health, surviving on hand-to-mouth agriculture.

The source of food in this household was the return given after work and and this was supplemented with the home grown food which could hardly sustain the large family of more than twelve members. The household members survived on a single carbohydrate meal per day, mainly porridge. As a result, children manifested signs of malnutrition.

Household members receiving mosquito bed nets

Some children dropped out of school at an early age and some of them are child-mothers. According to the care giver, this is because the low household economic status cannot uphold children in school. Family members were prone to malaria as they were not sleeping under mosquito bed nets.

In response to this unpleasant situation, the household was provided with mosquito bed nets from the Peace Corps and the US Presidential Malaria Initiative, which greatly improved the health status of the family members.

Family receiving economic booster packages from KCDO: pigs and maize bran

In addition, Kyamaganda Community Development Organization, with support from Rakaii Health Science Program, provided a booster grant of one pig and maize bran in October-December quarter, with hope that this income generating activity will have a multiplier effort to sustain and uphold the household. The household will also receive farm inputs to improve food security and to improve the nutrition of members, especially the children. The household will be monitored closely in the subsequent period to access the progress that will be made.

Piggery Pop-Up

The Covid-19 pandemic has reached Uganda, and KCDO offices are being closed; the piggery is being temporarily disbanded. Fortunately, notwithstanding the pandemic, the KCDO piggery is providing frontline micro-economic opportunities for local women in the Lwengo District of Uganda.

As Jack Neighbor notes in a recent article in National Geographic, “Women have long been underestimated and underutilized in many societies, including across Africa. Now, through hard work, global commitments, and localized training initiatives, women entrepreneurs are making their mark on the economies of southern Africa.”

Each piglet, with her bag of food, is ready to start a new piggery

To Neighbor’s point, both the piggery and KCDO are using this opportunity to provide 20 local women with booster grants and materials to start their own businesses.  KCDO has been teaching entrepreneurial skills for the past year.  The women graduates are now provided with the tools for success.

Willy writes, “Am happy to inform you that today, Saturday, we have been able to support 20 women with income generating projects to assist them in these trying moments.  10 women got pigs, animal feed and booster feeds to start their own piggery schemes at the household level.  Others have got retail shops items like merchandise goods, drums for brewery, seedlings, fertilizers since its planting season, among others.”

And he says,

“We are grateful to Wonderland BookSavers and the team who helped us start the piggery project that is supporting other small businesses for rural poor women in Kyamaganda community and Lwengo District.”

This is a great example of successful micro-entrepreneurship, which started with a fund-raising pool party in the USA and 8 months later concludes with financial independence for 20 women and their families in Uganda.

 “Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves.” Romans 12:10

WOMEN

One of the main objectives of KCDO is to provide women with the knowledge and opportunities to improve their lives and the lives of their children. We actively provide fundamental education in the areas of farming and animal husbandry. One example is our recent foray into pig farming. Women have been learning every aspect of pig farming, from piglet care to the economics of running and maintaining a successful farm, including encouraging interactions with neighboring farming communities to build a better breeding program.

Our programs provide women with the economic knowledge necessary for them to engage in small business entrepreneurship.

We welcome financial assistance that would address the ability for women to begin individual small business enterprises. Statistics have shown that women-owned business are the most successful means of improving the lives of entire families. Contact us if you would like to expand opportunities for women.

PIGGERY

We are very excited that we now have a small piggery which can create economic independence, as well as supplying a sustainable food source for our community.

We built every part of our pig farm ourselves.

We poured the concrete and painted all the timber with oil to prevent wood rot.

We built a rain water catchment system so that clean water will run into a water tank and our pigs will be healthy.

This is our water tank.

We now have 22 piglets and one boar.

The women of our community are maintaining the piglets and our taking the lead in managing this business.

This is our first opportunity to create economic independence for the vulnerable families residing in Kyamaganda.

Funds for our piggery were raised by Wonderland BookSavers, Make a Splash for Uganda fundraiser.

Wonderland BookSavers decorated the envelopes. Guests were asked to donate the number of dollars depicted on the envelope. Inside each envelope was a special message, thanking the contributor.

This simple fund raiser helped change our opportunities and our lives.

If you would like to help expand our piggery, please Contact us.

How exciting to be part of building a piggery in Uganda! Contact us to be part of the magic.