Projects

Background information

More than 70% of the population in Lango sub-region lives below the poverty line with over 75% of living in rural areas. The rural population depends mostly on agriculture. Due to agricultural activities marked seasonality, almost all households in rural areas become idle during the dry months of December, January, February and March. Adoption of apiary as an alternative project and an appropriate way of conserving the environment would be ideal.

LCT by working in partnerships with the Civil Society Organisations in 2006 and consequently in 2018, Youth at Work Development Initiative (YAWODI) in Lango Sub-region have identified crucial issues affecting the community as summarised below:

1. Capacity Building

LCT had consultations with local leaders and CSOs after its formation in 2003 and has been following up various groups to map out the needs of communities and the capacity of CSOs to meet those needs as follows:

• The need to identify the best ways to work with local partners and to develop the knowledge, skills and abilities (human capital) of poor people to enable them identify and implement sustainable and home-grown programmes for improving their livelihoods.
• To implement some of the recommendations in the report, LCT carried out an assessment of the capacity of Civil Society Organisations (CSO) in Lira to effectively serve the needs of their beneficiaries and to work in partnership with UK based charities.
• The CSOs need to support in developing the knowledge, skills and work practices of the people who work in them. Another finding is that there is no second-tier infrastructure organisation in Lira to support the CSOs and that the District Administration does not have the experience and resources for the effective coordination of the work of CSOs in 2006. To overcome this, the CSOs consulted and the District Administration has requested LCT’s assistance and to implement a capacity building project.

2. Youth at Work Development Initiative (YAWODI)

YAWODI during its annual general meeting in December 2018 tasked the project officers to conduct a needs assessment to ascertain the needs of the communities that showed interest in the introduction of self-help projects to enhance livelihoods through on-farm and combat the negative effects of climatic issues by introducing homestead based biodiversity conservation and its replication processes in other areas.

A needs assessment was conducted through focus group discussions organized by YAWODI team where they were able to observe status and identify the target group. The beneficiaries’ priorities and suggested strategies were identified. The goal of the focus group discussions were to provide YAWODI with an evidence base of the experiences, views and attitudes of the communities with a view to informing planning of the initiation of a self- help project and its replication. The following underlying objectives were also identified:

• To profile the current experiences, attitudes, expectations and behaviours of the communities towards encouraging environment conservation in order reduce negative effects such as drought and flooding.
• To identify gaps in existing service offerings and practical ways in which unfulfilled needs can be met more effectively.
• To enhance YAWODI’s own understanding and the community as a whole of this key issue and the organizations ability to develop effective, evidence based responses and recommendations.

3. Relief Supplies

• LCT delivered relief supply to displaced groups of people in Lira.
• In September 2019, organised a food supply to Ngetta Orphans, Lira Uganda.