Refugees Engage in Productive Work

 Refugees in Invempi Settlement camp have started engaging in Productive work to sustain themselves.

This follows the recent food prioritization by World food program where the most vulnerable refugees are the only one considered when giving out food.

Angella Adale, a south Sudanese refugee living in Invempi camp said ever since they came into the settlement in 2017, only fewer refuges have benefited from free food. This forced her to go out and look for other means of surviving.

Under the food Prioritization, the most vulnerable who includes the elderly and sickly refugees receives 8kg of food per month. ‘’ people are already categorized in levels, it is something they call prioritization, where they take the most vulnerable people to support and then those one who are able bodied are left out. Level one can at least get 8kg per person per-month, level two they get 3 kg per person and then level three they don’t get anything.’’ She spoke.

She said the prioritization has left many of them out hence they resorted to acquiring life skills which have enabled them to improve their livelihoods. These skills are Soap Making, Agro- ecology, Bakery, Piggery among others.

She said in 2022, they obtained the leadership and life-skills through trainings organized by Community Transformation Agenda-COTA in partnership with Action Aid Uganda International-AAIU.

‘’It has been a very wonderful moment since I started engaging in their activities that is in the year of 2022. By then I did not know anything about being a leader. So, the first thing Cota did with Action Aid was to train us in the leadership skills’’. She said.

These very organizations also equipped us with knowledge on gender-based issues in the family, where a woman is supposed to also decide in the family as well. By then we were not able to do that because of our cultural norms. I was able to come and implement it in my family, as I talk now, me and my husband, we can understand ourselves, I can also make a decision in the family, and he can go with that. She added.

‘’So, the leadership skills which was given to me, I was able to mentor other women around my village to also be leaders and as I talk now, there women who have also picked interest in the leadership skills’’. She stated.

In addition to the leadership skills, they also obtained skilling in various enterprises which have positively impacted their lives.

According to Adale, she can now ably look after her family with proceeds from farming, soap making among other enterprises which se engages in alongside other community members.

‘’Skills like soap making has really changed my life in a way that I can be able to buy for myself some things that I used not to have. And then I am able to stand on my own in my family. It's a bit different from the way we came from South Sudan. Those days, things were really very hard. But with these interventions. By putting the acquired skills into practice I have managed to start a farm where I and my family members have planted four acres of G.nuts and the sorghum’’ she added.

She noted that at the same time, she managed to plant bananas in the same space of the land.

We were also trained how to make local organic pesticides, which we use in our gardens instead applying the artificial ones. She said.

Another group named Budget Maker found in Zone 1, Point H in Invempi Camp decided to engage in piggery and other enterprise which they believe has greatly improved their livelihood.

Betty Juana, a members of Budget makers group, said that they managed to get some members around 14, who came and registered their names. ‘’ we are going to struggle such that at least every member buys a pig, either a pair or one so we start to raise them and when they multiply then we shall see in the community, and we bring more people in our group’’. She noted.

‘’We have also come up with another idea of having a saving box, and we are still waiting for the number of members to reach up 30 and we have another plan that in case the pigs multiply we’ll open up a business to support our members”, she added.

The same group has also ventured into rearing Guinea pigs (Big Rats), which are delicacy among south Sudanese nationals.

‘’ When these Big Rats multiply, we can sale to community members because they like them a lot, they say they are medicinal and when they eat them it increases on blood in their bodies’’. She spoke.

Another group of young people in the same refugee settlement is engaged in Bakery, the make cakes, Doughnuts, among other snacks which they sale in the community. According to James Malish the head of T.44 group has enabled dozens of youths to earn a living.

Solomon Okiror, monitoring and evaluation assistant at Community transformation a gender (COTA) explains that they introduced these skilling programs to solve the social challenges within the refugee settlement such as Gender Based Violence (GBV).

‘’We have trained a number of youths about 60 in soap making, Bakery and we have established two bakery groups one in zone one and another in Zone two, the youth are already in operation because in our package we train and give startup kits’’ he noted.

‘’We also realized that one of the greatest things that escalate GBV in families is economic stress, when we did an assessment in the community majority of married women reported that violence normally resulted from asking local basic needs in the family, so we took it as a recommendation to train the young people to be in position to make own soap not only for sale but also for domestic consumption’’. He added.

On her part, Mercy Mundulu, Programs and fundraising manager at Action Aid Uganda noted that most times communities need to be supported to be more resilient but also promoting their livelihoods.

 “We ensure that we streamline our actions with some of the government agencies in humanitarian related activities to avoid duplicity but also we build the capacity of the district to respond specifically to areas of GBV and also ensure they have a layered approach to managing issues between the refugee host communities and the settlements.”