Sustainable Livelihood and Economic Empowerment

INTENT
Improved sustainable livelihood, increased descent jobs, Reduced poverty and economic inequality.

STRATEGIC OBJECTIVE
To improve the  livelihood and economic status of the economically dis-advantaged communities, especially the youth, women and the urban poor.

RATIONALE
Uganda has made significant  strides in economic growth and development. All the key macro and micro-economic indicators, including GDP, infrastructure, inflation and social capital have significantly improved over the last 20 years.

And yet with all the above improvement, the proportion of the poor population is increasing from 19.7% to 21.4% corresponding to 8 million people by 2017 (UBOS/UDHS); Income  inequality is widening (from 0.40 to 0.42 between 2012/13 – 2016/17 finance year); and un-employment, especially among the youth, is growing rapidly.

Agriculture, which employs 64.6% of the working age population is still mostly subsistence and national investment is still below the 2014 Malobo declaration (on Accelerated Agricultural Growth and Transformation) of at least 10% public expenditure invested in agriculture. Uganda’s focus is now on the attainment of NDP III and the Global Agenda 2030 Sustainable Development Goals. Central to this aspiration is sustainable livelihood  and economic empowerment for the citizenry.

STRATEGY

  1. Supporting innovations along the agriculture value chain aimed at transforming the agriculture sector into a source of descent jobs and wealth, especially for the millions of small holder farmers;
  2. Deepening and broadening finance inclusion/access, especially for the mostly excluded populations, based on the Islamic banking model;
  3. Supporting the expansion of entrepreneurship, vocational and technical skills especially for the un-employed youth, women and urban poor;
  4. Building the capacity of local institutions and citizens to adapt and adopt to the growing climate change and environmental risks;
  5. Contributing to bio-diversity restoration and management; and 6.Building the capacity of community led economic institutions.