Retain Orphan Girl Children in Schools in Uganda

Retention of orphan girl children project in Pallisa, Budaka and Kibuku districts – Eastern Uganda aims at empowering 80 widows in commercial vegetable growing to improve their family’s nutrition and income to pay school meals and scholastic materials for 1450 school going orphan girl children between 8-18years. The 80 widows have been empowered with modern knowledge and skills in vegetable growing and provided with vegetable seeds, pesticides and spray pumps as a sustainability means for the project. This is the January – April report and it is located on GlobalGiving website and our website www.kagumudevelopment.org . The report clearly comprises of the progress of the project for the quarter ended March, 2017 with financial support from all stakeholders.

Current status of the project:
The following were done in the last quarter:

1. Enrolled more ten (10) widows to benefit from the project and they were given hands-on farm training in vegetable growing
2. Trained 25 community leaders on Child Protection practices to reduce on child abuse and child rights violations in the community.
3. KADO has provided vegetable seeds to twelve women for commercial production to raise funds to support 25 primary school girl children.
4. We have monitored 28 girls in schools.

Challenges

1. Prolonged drought that delayed the planting process
2. The overwhelming number of girl children dropping out of school due to lack of support.
3. Limited funding by the organization to meet the high expectations of the beneficiaries.
4. Two of our were raped and defiled and dropped out of school

Recommendation
we are kindly requesting for more support from our partners in order for us to be able to implement our intended goals.

 Testimony of Robina

This is a story from Robina the daughter of Catherine of Kagumu S/C in Kibuku district. Robina is currently 13 years, she was to sit for her Primary Leaving Examination last year December 2016. Before the examination, she was impregnated by a sugar daddy who even deceived her to make an abortion. After abortion the sugar daddy abandoned her as such she missed the examination which she had registered for. The guardians chased her from their home and she started practicing prostitution and KADO identified her roaming on the street moving with bad groups and counseled her, and the guardians and later they accepted to take her back to school this year 2017. The girl accepted to go back to school and complete her Primary Seven, she promised to join a vocational institution for a course so that she can have a certificate which she will use in future for any employment so that she can earn a living.

This is a true story and explains how our project works in respect to support of orphan girl children in Uganda.

Links:

• http://www.google.com

Summary

Retention of orphan girl children project in Budaka and Kibuku Districts in Eastern Uganda aims at empowering 49 widows in commercial vegetable growing to improve their family’s nutrition and income to pay school meals and scholastic materials for 1200 school going orphan girl children between 12-18years. The 49 widows is being empowered with modern knowledge and skills in vegetable growing and they were provided with vegetable seeds, pesticides and spray pumps as a startup for the project. This is the November 2016 - January 2017, project report to partners and it is located on Global giving website and our website www.kagumudevelopment.org . The report clearly comprises of the progress of the project for the quarter with financial support from all stakeholders.

Current status of the project

The following was done in the last quarter:

1. Currently the project provides support to 18 widows and 39 orphan girl children are supported in schools
2. 15 widows have gained experience and initiating less labour intensive agronomic practices e.g. kitchen gardening using organic manure to ensure that they obtain regular harvest and sales
3. 13 widows have joined village saving and loaning associations (VSLA) and have opens up the kiosk in the trading center buying and selling from others.

Challenges.

1. The organization is faced with limited funding to support widows to undergo commercial vegetables production in order to maximize production and sustain the buyer’s demand
2. Some widows lack land and therefore, the organization hire land for them and they practice collective production.

Recommendation
The organization requests all development partners to extend their giving hand to the project to facilitate the implementation of this project in order to improve the socio- economic empowerment of widow led households, as this is the only viable project in terms of providing quick returns. Currently, in Uganda there is no specific programme to support widows yet they have a big Burden of the OVCs.

Testimony from the beneficiary

This is a testimony from Kabejja the wife of late Botte Samuel of Kagumu Sub County in Kibuku District who died of Cancer of the legs and left 04 orphan girl children. Samuel was a very hard working man and could support his family effectively. However, he didn’t empower Margret to engage in economic activities.

After the death of Samuel, Kabejja had nothing to show as a source of income to support the family. Thus, Kabejja had taken the decision to leave the home and at least get married somewhere else to some other man, as the brothers to her late husband were not giving any helping hand to her family yet she hardly had income sources to solve domestic needs like procurement of essential commodities and payment of medical bills for the family members and to pay them school fees in schools.

The organization however, identified Kabejja, empowered her in vegetable growing using the small piece of land she is seated at and she is able to grow a variety of vegetables, sells them and access some income to support her family. Currently, Kabejja is now among the women who have joined village saving and loaning association and thus her household income levels has gradually improved and two (02) of her four (04) daughters are who had initially left school, so as to pave way for the two older ones, have now gone back to continue with their studies with assured support from the project run by the lone mother.

This is a true story and explains how our project works in respect to support of orphan girl children in Uganda.

Links:

• www.kagumudevelopment.org