Helping People Help Myself
Sunday, April 10, 2011
Uganda Mission 1/2 - Projects Supervision and Sites Visits
From March 21st to April 2nd, I was on biz trip to Uganda to review the progress of 5 agricutlure projects varies from income enhancement and livestock desease control to a bit more rural infrastructure such as rural feeder roads and rural markets. This was my first trip to Uganda so imagine how excited I was!
Before the departure, I had to read so many project documents because these projects were managed by other people daily basis and I was simply a part of a mission (biz trip) team; i.e. an outsdier of the projects. Reviewing more than 1000 pages in 5 days and providing some preliminary analytical comments focusing on financial management looked like a grad school life ;)
The preparation as I did just for myself, however, was very helpful once the team started the deep discussion about project progress and raised many issues incuding audit and financial management where I pitched in.
The fun part (at least for me) was the sites visits in various districts in Uganda - Nakasongola, Lira and Gulu (boarder to South Sudan!) while driving more than 1000km of bumpy roads in 3 days......with blackout at rural hotels and mosquitos carrying Malaria... Anyway here are some pictures that you can see the ground view of rural Uganda.
Rural houses in Nakasongola district
Bumpy feeder roads (obviouslly a lack of maintenance......)
A completed project road - very different from the previous example!
Villagers gave us their feedback about the roads saying they could reduce their transport cost (both fuel and time - time is also important since they rent a truck hourly-basis for their logistic business to briing cassava, potato, corn etc) and increase their business revenue by doing more in the same time duration.
The rural market for livestock looks like this at least in Gulu district, Uganda
Now we supported to establish a bigger and more confortable market facility so that more farmers can sell their products and more buyers can be attracted from various villages even from South Sudan!
This is another livestock facility under construction in Nakasongola district. Traders will come to buy livestock (mainly cattles). The estimate of trade volume is 150 cattles in every 2 weeks.
Before the departure, I had to read so many project documents because these projects were managed by other people daily basis and I was simply a part of a mission (biz trip) team; i.e. an outsdier of the projects. Reviewing more than 1000 pages in 5 days and providing some preliminary analytical comments focusing on financial management looked like a grad school life ;)
The preparation as I did just for myself, however, was very helpful once the team started the deep discussion about project progress and raised many issues incuding audit and financial management where I pitched in.
The fun part (at least for me) was the sites visits in various districts in Uganda - Nakasongola, Lira and Gulu (boarder to South Sudan!) while driving more than 1000km of bumpy roads in 3 days......with blackout at rural hotels and mosquitos carrying Malaria... Anyway here are some pictures that you can see the ground view of rural Uganda.
Rural houses in Nakasongola district
Bumpy feeder roads (obviouslly a lack of maintenance......)
Villagers gave us their feedback about the roads saying they could reduce their transport cost (both fuel and time - time is also important since they rent a truck hourly-basis for their logistic business to briing cassava, potato, corn etc) and increase their business revenue by doing more in the same time duration.
The rural market for livestock looks like this at least in Gulu district, Uganda
Now we supported to establish a bigger and more confortable market facility so that more farmers can sell their products and more buyers can be attracted from various villages even from South Sudan!
