KIKANDWA RURAL COMMUNITIES DEVELOPMENT ORGANIZATION (KIRUCODO)

NGO REG. NO. S. 5914/6476; NPO REG NO. 109960

2007-2008 ANNUAL REPORT

Secretariat

Kikandwa Rural Communities Development Organization

P.O.BOX 494 Kikandwa Village, Mukono, Uganda

Tel: +256-712-848448, +256-414-670686

E-Mail:

Web: www.krcdevorg.weebly.com

Table of Contents

page

INTRODUCTION 3

MASSAGE FROM THE CHAIRMAN 4

MASSAGE FROM THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR 5

MASSAGE FROM THE CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER 6

SUMMARY OF ACTIVITIES DONE 7

Beekeeping-Hive-making workshop 7

Scholastic material donation to entire Pupils of Kikandwa Primary School 8

Participation in CTA survey 10

New website donation by Pamela 10

Community Information Resource Centre 10

Proposed Community Information Resource Centre 11

Financial Report 12

Future Projects. 13

Rural Communities Criminal Justice Awareness Project 13

Expansion of Community Information Resource Centre 13

Establishment of a Community Nursery School for the needy 13

Beekeeping extension 14

Our Humble Request 14

Acknowledgement 14

INTRODUCTION

Kikandwa Rural Communities Development Organization is a Non-Governmental Organization registered with NGO Board (S. 5914/ 6476) under the Non-Governmental Organizations Registration statute, 1989. Further, the Organization is incorporated as a Non-Profit group under Section 16(1) of the Companies Act with Reg. No. 109960. The Organization was formed mainly to focus on Rural Communities development in various sectors for self empowerment.

The Organization started by a small group of community people who were then running small income generating activities (SIGA) so as to earn daily income for self sustenance within Kikandwa village local council-1, an area with devastating social and economic implications including but not limited to lower literacy level, lower employment rate, poor hygienic conditions, increasing poverty, lack of health care services and many more.

As the Organization gains its sharp, the following components have been put in place for effective operation:

  • Community Development Component
  • Networking Component
  • Education Component

KIKANDWA RURAL COMMUNITIES DEVELOPMENT ORGANIZATION (KIRUCODO) ORGANIZATION COMPONENTS

MASSAGE FROM THE CHAIRMAN

First of all, let me thank God for the great protection and care to all of us and for having enabled us to pass through this period successfully.

Secondly, I thank everybody for having participated tirelessly in many developmental projects that we have undergone, hence uplifting the self sustenance of our community. I particularly want to thank Ms Karen Hackshaw (Program Coordinator of CTA and Mr. Giacomo Rambaldi (Senior Programs Coordinator CTA) for having traveled all the way from Italy and Netherlands to come and visit us in Kikandwa village and visited some of our projects on the ground. I am happy to note that through this CTA official visit, we have managed to obtain a number of publications mostly on Agriculture and rural development for our community resource centre and others.

On the same note, let me thank our Executive Director Mr. Robert Kibaya for having traveled both in Africa and overseas from where he has managed to get many development partners for our Organization and the community in general and to bring in new ideas. I am happy to notice that 2007-2008 program overviews reflects a success in the year’s work-plan though there still a number of challenges in connection to inadequate financial support.

Lastly, we are yet to build capacity for more developmental programs as reflected in our action plan in the next financial year. Our emphasis will be on developing a sustainable water supply in the community as the local farmers no longer depend on unreliable rain seasons. With a constant water supply within the community, local farmers will be able to irrigate their crops to meet the food demand in the country and also to earn them a reasonable income. Water is still a major problem in the area and we are calling on any development partner in the field to work hand in hand to have this solved.

I hereby appreciate everybody for the support and commendable job well-done towards achieving our goals and objectives.

I thank you all.

Yours in service,

John Waliggo

(Chairman)

MASSAGE FROM THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR

First I thank God for his protection up to this moment. Secondly, I thank all our staff for their hard work, commitment among others despite the fact that there have been various hardships here and there.

2007-2008 has been a year with both successes and challenges. Before I go further, let me take this opportunity to thank all our partners like CTA www.cta.int, Bees For Development www.beesfordevelopment.org, Tactical www.tacticaltech.org, Tear Fund www.tearfund.org, Jim & Pamela Smith Family and Havana Butter Community, Caspar Wilhelm Schwalbe of Berlin Technical College Germany and Mary Ma of Beijing Foreign Studies University China and friends, Mr. James Driscoll and Murray Reid of New Zealand, For all their generous contributions towards the development of our Communities.

KIRUCODO’ 2007-2008 work-plan proposed a number of activities and due to inadequate funding, we were unable to accomplish some of them but I am happy to say that a number of them were achieved.

Our major focus for the year was to encourage free information access to all community people. To effect this, we established a small Community Information Access Resource Centre in our offices in Kikandwa with donated publications mainly from CTA, then Bees for Development, Tactica, Tear Fund, Uganda Human Rights Commission, among others.

Since we consider information sharing among community people and worlds around as the main avenue through which we can develop our rural communities here in Uganda, we proposed a bigger Community Information Access Resource Centre which will house about twenty (20) computers and a library that can accommodate about thirty (30) readers.

Besides free information access to all community people, we have plans to establish new innovative Community Income Generating Activities (CIGA) through skills development like sustainable handcraft making, sustainable agriculture like improved poultry and animal breed keeping like goats, sustainable beekeeping, and others.

Our future focus is to ensure free up to date modern information access and training within the rural communities, market research and skills development for new job creation in rural communities and lastly quality education for all children in a good structured environment.

Lastly, with a change in climate, there is a change in seasons which has greatly affected our local farmers. At the moment, a local farmer doesn’t know when he or she can really plant her or his crops with unpredictable rain seasons. This has increased poverty in the area based on poor yields as farmers can no longer able to predict correctly when the rains and when not. As almost all farmers in the area depend of rain seasons, we think of diverting them from this and think of starting an irrigation approach. The area has got very few water point and for the above approach to be implemented we need to develop new water sources in the area like tap water, massive rain water harvest, underground water extraction, among others. We call on partners with the expertise in the water field to work hand in hand while developing a sustainable water program in our communities.

All in all, for the above to be achieved, we humbly request for your support, advise, partnership building and God’s guidance.

Again, I thank you all.

Yours in service,

Robert Kibaya

(Executive Director)

MASSAGE FROM THE CHIEF FINANCIAL OFFICER

We thank God for the support and protection up to this day. I thank all our friends and partners for their generous contributions towards our Organization.

With this global financial crisis, financial year 2007-2008 has been with many challenges and we still learn how to manage effectively in the new global changing financial systems.

Right, financial year 2007-2008, was supported by mostly our donors about 39% contribution, followed by 30% contribution from within the Organization management committee, 21% from the community and 10% from in-kind contributions.

2007-2008 proposed itemized budget was quarter way met and a number of proposed activities were not implemented fully. The financial committee which sat in the second quarter proposed a number of strategies and among them was to create sustainable income generating activities within the Organization to help in running day to day affairs of the Organization and permanent staff maintenance. The issue was forwarded to the governing board which will come up with a position paper on the same.

Lastly, financial support for the Organization is still very minimal to meet all the proposed development programs and there is still a need for partnership building with various stakeholders. It is our humble request therefore, to call for your cooperation in this regard to help us meet the needs of our community.

Thank you.

Respectfully Yours,

Kiddu Edward

(Chief Financial Officer)

SUMMARY OF ACTIVITIES DONE

  • Beekeeping-Hive-making workshop
  • Scholastic material donation to entire Pupils of Kikandwa Primary School
  • Participation in CTA survey
  • New website donation by Pamela
  • Community Information Resource Centre
  • Financial Report

Future Projects.

  • Rural Communities Criminal Justice Awareness Project/ Justice Makers
  • Expansion of Community Information Resource Centre
  • Establishment of a Community Nursery School for the needy
  • Beekeeping extension

Beekeeping-Hive-making workshop

A hives making workshop was organized by KIKANDWA RURAL COMMUNITIES DEVELOPMENT ORGANIZATION in Kikandwa Village on 19th July 2008 in Kikandwa Primary School grounds from 10:00am to 03:00pm. Reading training materials were donated by Bees For Development (www.beesfordevelopment.org) a UK charity which aims at developing and promoting beekeeping worldwide especially in developing countries. In addition, CTA (www.cta.int) a Netherlands Based Organization donated various publications of which some were used for the workshop especially those on bees.

The workshop was attended by over twenty community farmers who acquired skills in making local hives and KTB. The main challenge farmers face are: acquiring hive making tools and materials which are expensive for them like smokers, sows, bee tools, bee suits, among others.

As an Organization, we have a plan of distributing five (5) hives per household in Kikandwa Village on a loan basis where the farmer can pay back in terms of bee products like honey, propolis, bee wax, and others for a specified period. Whatever paid back then can be used for extending the industry to other communities.

For the above to be effective, we are looking for experts with diverse experience in the industry like Queen raring techniques where a farmer can be loaned out a beehive with a queen already installed. We are appealing to any person or Organization whom we can work hand in hand to have this developed and implemented in our community to help poor farmers get out of intensive poverty.

Scholastic material donation to entire Pupils of Kikandwa Primary School

On 26th June 2008, Kikandwa Rural Communities Development Organization- KIRUCODO distributed scholastic materials donated by Jim & Pamela Smith, their community and friends of Havanah Butter in USA. Jim & Pamela bought some scholastic from their savings and they also received other materials from community people and their friends. It was so expensive for them to ship the materials to us here in Uganda as the customs was demanding more taxes higher than the actual total price of the materials. After much struggle here and there, they decided to send the money through our Executive Director Mr. Robert Kibaya. The money donated was worth US$ 500 which we used to buy enough scholastic materials we distributed to every pupil in Kikandwa Primary School totaling to over 300 pupils.

Below is the expenditure breakdown of the scholastic material donation.

EXPENDITURE REPORT FOR $ 500 (SHS. 787,700) DONATED
BY JIM & PAMELA SMITH FAMILY, COMMUNITY AND FRIENDS
NO. / ITEM / UNIT PRICE (SHS.) / QTY / TOTAL (SHS.)
1 / Pens / 4,000 per packet / 10 / 40,000
2 / Special pens for teachers / 6,000 per packet / 2 / 12,000
3 / Books / 1,246 per dozen / 55 dozens / 68,500
4 / Mathematical Set / 8,500 per dozen / 10.8 dozens / 90,900
5 / Pencils / 7,000 per gross / 4.2 grosses / 29,000
6 / Volunteer allowance / 25,000 per person / 6 people / 150,000
7 / Transport / 93,300 / 93,300
8 / Video Camera Hiring / 60,000 per day / 1 / 60,000
9 / Stationery / 53,000 / 53,000
10 / Telephone expenses / 25,000 / 25,000
11 / Digital Camera Hiring / 35,000 per day / 1 / 35,000
12 / DVD and Burning photos on / 5,000 each / 1 / 5,000
13 / Digital Camera batteries / 3,000 each pair / 2 / 6,000
14 / Office Maintenance / 100,000 for three days / 5 people / 100,000
16 / Postage and Packaging / 20,000 / 1 / 20,000
TOTAL / 787,700
Organized by: Kibaya Robert
Position: Executive Director
Date: 29TH June 2008
Organization Name: Kikandwa Rural Communities Development Organization
Address: 494 Kikandwa Village, Mukono, Uganda
Tel: +256-712-848448; +256-414-670686
Sign and Stamp:

NOTE: Exchange rate by date 1US$ = 1575.4

Participation in CTA survey

In May and June The Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation (CTA www.cta.int) conducted a survey on the use of its information products and services in ten countries in Africa, the Caribbean and the Pacific. Kikandwa Rural Communities Development Organization (KIRUCODO) was honored to take part in the survey. On 25th June 2008 a team of CTA experts visited us in our offices in Kikandwa village. In the office they were welcomed by a group of community farmers and the executive committee of KIRUCODO. After introduction and signing the visitors’ book, the experts began with the exercise which included technical questions to our Executive Director for about three hours. It was coming to 06:20pm when the team departed.

New website donation by Pamela

There many achievements the Organization has got but we would like to treat this has our special. This is because, the website was designed by our Organization friend Pamela Smith who is actually disabled. She invested in both time and money to have it up to this material time. The website is hosted on weebly and it is www.krcdevorg.weebly.com Till then, she has been updating and maintaining the website on our behalf. We pray to God to grant her abundantly for this great service. This has boosted the Organization more than before has stakeholders worldwide visit the site and get to know who we are and the services we offer and what we are actually doing down here.