Mountains of the Moon University (MMU) in Collaboration with Joint Efforts to Save the Environment (JESSE) on Thursday 05th September 2024 at Tooro Botanical Gardens, Fort Portal officially launched a new 3-year project dubbed Strengthening Smallholder Farmer Resilience to Climate Change through Joint learning, development and evaluation of contextualised solutions-A case of the Rwenzori and Kigezi highland regions of Uganda (SFR2CC).
MMU and JESSE will implement the project on the side of the Rwenzori region with Kabale University and Kigezi Women in Development (KWID) on the side of the Kigezi region. Karangura Sub-county, Kabarole district will be one of the communities in Rwenzori region where the project will be implemented.
The SFR2CC project aims at bridging the gap between higher education and smallholder farmers through capacity building of MMU and Kabale University and smallholder farming communities within these highland regions; support the development of a multi-stakeholder driven community-embedded interdisciplinary Master’s programme in Water Resources at MMU and; participatory review of Master of Science in Environment and Natural Resources programme at Kabale University with an aim of making them responsive to the water management challenges of the smallholder farmers.
The Project will be guided by four specific objectives: development of a multistakeholder-driven community-embedded interdisciplinary MSc in Water Resources at MMU and review of MSc Environment and Natural Resources at Kabale University; development and implementation of a multistakeholder-driven gender-responsive research agenda to guide participatory action-oriented research; participatory co-development, testing and evaluation of farm water management innovations suitable in the local context and; formulation of an inclusive platform for multi-stakeholder engagement to foster water knowledge exchange.
The project approach will be a bottom-up approach of curriculum development and review with farmers being an integral part of the whole process alongside other stakeholders; capacity building focussing on participatory optimisation of on-farm water use through low-cost irrigation innovations, harnessing rainwater (both roof and surface) using it in dry periods and improving soil and water conservation and; a holistic (ecological, social and economic) participatory evaluation of both indigenous and conventional farm water use technologies.
The Project team on the side of MMU is Assoc. Prof. Violet Kisakye (Project team leader), Dr. John Sekajugo (Deputy team leader), Dr. Jessica Kabasiita, Clovis Kabaseke, Dr. Mary Ekyaligonza, Dr. Evarist Ngabirano, Christine Kobugabe (Finance and admin) and Mwesigwa Ali Junior (Project accountant) while on the side of JESSE is Christopher Businge (Lead at JESE), Godfrey Rugumayo and Rebecca Angumye.
Assoc. Prof. Violet Kisakye during the project launch thanked the Project funders and called on all project implementation teams to account for every penny to allow for further funding in future.
Tusiime T. Samuel, Senior Sociologist at the Ministry of Water and Environment, who was the Chief Guest at the Project launch welcomed the project since it was answering the call of the community challenges. He said River Mpanga covers 16 districts, and the downstream smallholder farmers are the ones that degrade the environment, adding that when we fix the problems of smallholder farmers, we are doing a lot in conserving the environment.
Elkanah Kahuzo, the LC III Chairperson of Karangura Sub County thanked MMU and JESSE for bringing the project to his sub-county. He pledged full support to the project. He was happy that the Project was going to sponsor some of his successful electorates to a master’s programme included in the project write-up.
The Project launch brought together different stakeholders from the Ministry of Water and Environment, Uganda Wildlife Authority (UWA) Fort Portal City, Kabarole District, Sub County of Karangura, Joint Efforts to Save the Environment (JESSE), Mountains of the Moon University (MMU), Natural Resource Defence Initiatives (NRDI) among others.
Heights For Progress