Tag Archives: Hunger

Some students receiving food relief carry packages from university gate to their hostels

UCU rescues hungry students amidst lockdown

COVID-19, Students, , , , , ,


Some students receiving food relief carry packages from university gate to their hostels
Some students receiving food relief carry packages from university gate to their hostels

By Douglas Olum

At mid-morning on Thursday, May 14, 2020, and under the sun’s sharp burning rays, small groups of students banned from Uganda Christian University (UCU) under government COVID19 guidelines approached the main gate in Mukono. Students trickled in and out of the university, undergoing hand sanitizer spraying and temperature check exercises before entering.

As with all Ugandan universities since the country’s lockdown and university shutdowns started in late March, the students faced health scrutiny by university security officers and a medical worker. The students were hungry – struggling for roughly eight weeks without access to the regular university meals of tea, bread, rice, beans and, on occasion, chicken. While not the same as regular consumption, the UCU Office of the Director of Student Affairs provided some food relief.

The university’s intervention, supported by the Inter-Religious Council of Uganda, responded to television and news reports that revealed that university students were starving in nearby hostels, caught by the lockdown with no public transportation to leave.  The news reported by NTV Uganda and the Daily Monitor newspaper, coupled with direct phone calls to the Guild President, Timothy Kadaga, prompted an the necessary intervention.

An estimated 160 UCU students were stuck in various hostels and rentals around Mukono. At least 81 students got the first batch of the relief package which included; 10kg (22 pounds) bag of maize flour, a carton of 124ml (4.23 ounces) boxed milk, beans, powdered milk, cooking oil, (1kg or 35.3 ounces/2 lb.) of sugar and a bar of soap.

Students were interviewed anonymously to avoid shame that most felt about receiving assistance. They came, they said, after exhausting all other possible options to survive.

“I had just received my transport money to return home that evening when the president [Yoweri Kaguta Museveni] announced the ban on public transport,” one of them, a second-year Bachelor of Civil and Environmental Engineering student, said. “I had to use the money for upkeep but it even got finished within a week. I called home again and I was sent some more money, which also got finished. When I called again, I was told to wait because there was no money.”

A collection of the items
A collection of the items

For more than a week prior to the time of the food relief distribution, the 22-year old said he depended on his friends and well-wishing neighbors.

Just like him, another beneficiary who is on the UCU Sports Bursary, and residing at the St. Michael Historical Hostel, said he lived on porridge for three days and almost died. He recounted:

“My tummy was grumbling. My joints were weak. I kept turning in my bed, trying to find a position in which my tummy would stop hurting to no avail. I got up and tried to make porridge again, but there was no more sugar in the room. At that point, my body was shaking like I was standing on something vibrating. I fell back to bed and that was when I started thinking of alternative options like contacting the guild president.”

At that point, the student said he came to realize that food was not just mere quench for hunger, but life itself.

A female student pursuing a Bachelor of Business Administration echoed these thoughts. She said:  “The package may appear small but it means so much to me. At least I can be sure that I will feed myself and live for some time while I explore other options and wait for the end of the lockdown.”

A second batch of students received portions on Tuesday, May 19, taking the total to 150 beneficiaries. They were humbled and grateful, they said.

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To support Uganda Christian University programs, students, activities and services, go to www.ugandapartners.org and click on the “donate” button, or contact UCU Partners Executive Director, Mark Bartels, at m.t.bartels@ugandapartners.org

Agriculture students combat ‘silent hunger’ in rural Kumi

Faculty of Agricultural Sciences, Students, , , , ,


Nelson Mandela attends to a farmer’s pig in Olupet village, Kumi District
Nelson Mandela attends to a farmer’s pig in Olupet village, Kumi District

By Douglas Olum

Kumi is a district in Eastern Uganda. On average, it takes six hours by road to get there from the capital, Kampala. Like most parts of the country, Kumi is agro-based, but farming is largely done for survival only. Often farmers suffer from famine as pests and diseases destroy their crops. Sometimes, long droughts burn down the crops. The ultimate tragedy is starvation and death, including among children.

Odeke is a farmer in Olupet Village in Kumi Sub-County. While he was considered a commercial farmer in the village, Odeke said for a long time he was losing his crops to pests and diseases because he lacked the knowledge to control them.

Students from Uganda Christian University’s (UCU) department of Agricultural and Biological Sciences have been in Kumi District since May 2019 on an internship program targeted at contributing to innovations for sustainable rural development in Uganda. A team of six students was dispatched to three sub-counties, with a pair taking each sub-county under the program.

(L-R) Newton Kucel, Nelson Mandela and a farmer assess the crop quality as they harvest vegetables from a garden

Olupet Village received Newton Kucel and Nelson Mandela, both of whom are third-year Bachelor of Agricultural Science and Entrepreneurship students. The pair that has spent at least three months in the community carried out needs assessment, held farm clinics where they helped and trained farmers to identify different pests and diseases, taught preventive and control measures, and also established demonstration farms from which they taught the farmers commercial vegetables production, piggery, poultry farming and record keeping.

Mandela said that at the time they went to the village, they discovered that the farmers were suffering despite investing so much effort in their farms. He said crops were dying in the gardens out of treatable causes and even the little that the farmers could harvest would not help much because the farmers lacked ideas on how to market their products. And because of that, they designed measures to address those specific challenges.

Odeke said the students’ measures have helped them to manage and control various pests and diseases, improve their crop yields by making and using organic manure, cut their costs of production and also see new opportunities in poultry and piggery. He said they also learned to study the eating patterns of various pests, when to spray their crops and what quantity of pesticides to use. These were areas in which the farmers had no prior knowledge.

“To be sincere, these students have helped not only our group but the entire community,” Odeke said. “People have been calling me and flocking to my home from as far as five kilometers (3 miles away) to attend the farm clinics.”

The local farmers credit UCU for helping them.

“I am really so thankful to the students, their lecturers and the university for thinking about us,” Odeke said. “I feel indebted that you people are offering us a very important service for free yet we should have paid you. I am going to use the knowledge you have given us to teach my children and other farmers.”

At the time of this visit, the farmers were already harvesting sorghum and cow peas. The students were helping them to manage the post-harvest processes to control possible waste. They also were connecting with markets outside the region to establish competent prices for various products in order to save the farmers from exploitation by middle men.

Odeke said they were able to get a good yield of the two crops due to the encouragement of the students.  They are integrating sorghum with cow peas to control pod-suckers, a kind of pest that had bothered them and caused them so much loss in terms of yield for a very long time.

Ms. Ruth Buteme, a lecturer at the department who also doubled as the coordinator and students’ supervisor under the program, said the testimonies were quite encouraging and showed the need to carry more of such extension services to more villages and also other parts of the country.

“I am happy that the students were able to solve some problems here,” she said. “The world needs problem solvers. We are hoping that we can continue bringing more students here and also take them elsewhere in order to help our country develop. Uganda has to develop. And there is no way we are going to realize the desired development without involving the common man in the villages.”

In line with UCU’s vision to become a Centre of Excellence in the heart of Africa, Buteme said the department targets to become a Centre of Excellence in vegetable research to help combat silent hunger in Uganda.

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To support UCU students, programs and facilities, go to www.ugandapartners.org and click on the “donate” button or contact UCU Partners Executive Director, Mark Bartels, at mtbartels@gmail.com.