Throughout the pandemic and national elections in Uganda, grassroots organizations like KADI-U are continuing their community-level activities to make sure everyone has enough food and is on the path to a better life. (See all our current partner organizations.) I was so excited after reading their report to SIA of their activities in the last few months of the year. The volunteers who run KADI are so dedicated to making sure no one in their community is left behind. One of t

How are Ugandans fostering a more loving and inclusive society? Universal Love Ministries (ULM) is hosting a series of workshops, supported in part by Spirit in Action, at schools in Uganda. Their team talks with students and teachers about life planning skills and human rights, particularly the rights of LGBTI (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, intersex) people. At the end of the workshop, students are encouraged to form “inclusive clubs” to defend human rights in their s

The mission of the Mathare Dressmaking and Tailoring Training Centre in Nairobi is to train women and men to use the industrial sewing machines to enable them to get jobs. And, as I reported in June, 124 of the 181 trainees have managed to secure employment with Ruaraka Clothing Industries, a large employer in the area. In most cases the trainees are only able to get the skilled machine operator jobs because of the training centre. Studying factory jobs I consider this employ

We know the value of business training from our Small Business Fund program. Grant recipients are trained in marketing, record keeping, risk management, and planning so that they are well prepared to start their small enterprise. This helps them find the right product for the market and make sure their businesses will be profitable. Seeing the confidence that people have after the training, I am so excited to announce our new partnership with Junior Achievement (JA) to train

“This is an opportunity for me to change my life from idling and gossiping around in the community. I am happy that the number of cases involving me with other women will now reduce with this lifetime opportunity to gain embroidery and tailoring skills. I would like to specialize in school outfits like track suits and girl’s skirts. Thank you so much Progressive Volunteers.’’ Rosemary Ochieng is 19 years old and dropped out of school after elementary school. She lives in the

This has been a good year for Spirit in Action and our partners! It is so exciting to look back and see all that we have accomplished, and all that our amazing partners have done to bring more prosperity to families in their communities. New Small Business Fund Coordinator: This summer we added a new local coordinator to the Small Business Fund team! Hastings Phiri has already begun mentoring families in rural Malawi to start and run new businesses. Hastings is a dedicated co

“A time to renew our shared vision of working in the community so as to achieve a greater impact in alleviating poverty, and also share success stories!” Wambui Nguyo, Small Business Fund Coordinator in Nairobi, Kenya, offered the above tagline summary of our Small Business Fund Coordinator Conference in Kasozi Village last July. We traveled from five different countries (United States, Malawi, Kenya, Nigeria, and our two hosts in Uganda), arriving at the end of a small dusty

Women proud of their sweet potato harvest, at CIFORD Kenya. OFSP? Orange flesh sweet potato. Or, as I call them, those vegetables that are really tasty baked and topped with butter! While I’m used to the orange variety of sweet potatoes in North America, in Africa the white or yellow sweet potatoes are much more common. They taste similar but the white and yellow varieties are not nearly as nutritious as the vitamin A/beta-carotene-rich orange ones. It’s only in the last few

Five classic sewing machines and one high-tech machines are available for students. Jobs, jobs, jobs. Even more than in the US, people in Kenya are desperately seeking jobs that pay the bills and help their families thrive. Also like the US, people in Kenya turn to education to increase their job opportunities. Samro Polytechnic school in Eldoret Kenya, supported in part by a SIA grant, is focused on providing training in marketable skills, like tailoring, sewing, and compute

Women at a savings group meeting in Meru, Kenya. Have you noticed that many DIY (do-it-yourself) projects are best done DIT (do-it-together)? A friend’s DIY deck-building work party is much more done as a group rather than a drawn-out process done on his own. And the project is competed much sooner working together with everyone contributing! So maybe it’s no surprise that the same is also true for DIY saving. What is DIY saving? It could be anything from the informal savings

So much is going on this month for Spirit in Action partners! I’m excited to share some of these exciting updates with you: Last Tuesday, experienced local coordinators Canaan Gondwe (Malawi) and Dennis Kiprop (Eldoret, Kenya) met with our newest Small Business Fund (SBF) Coordinator-in-training! We are so excited to welcome Ms. Wambui Nguyo of Nairobi to our SIA team. She will be working with families in the Korongocho slum in Nairobi to start small businesses and reach a ne

A Parable by Tanya Cothran Once day a young woman had a great idea. She looked out over the lawn that filled the communal space in her apartment complex and realized that the space was being wasted. “No one even uses the lawn, but if we were to use the space to grow vegetables instead of grass many people would benefit,” she thought to herself. A well-managed farm in Malawi. Her idea excited her so much that she couldn’t help but tell everyone about her vision. She told neigh

Did you catch the hype and fury around the KONY 2012 video about Uganda last week? The video, by Invisible Children, Inc. told about the violence in Uganda in the recent past. However, many people in Uganda are presenting their own responses to the video. “How do you tell the story of Africans?” asks Rosebell Kagumire, a Ugandan blogger, “because if you are showing me as voiceless, as hopeless… you shouldn’t be telling my story if you don’t believe that I also have the power

Matthews (MAVISALO's Secretary) giving us one of his big smiles. “COMSIP…” called out Matthews, holding his hand in the air. “…Chop!” responded the fifty people gathered in the meeting room, as they brought down their hands in a chopping motion. The group is the Manyamula Village Savings and Loans organization, or MAVISALO, which Boyd and I visited last summer. And COMSIP is a Malawian government program designed to reduce (chop!) poverty by promoting a culture of saving. Aft

The first week of December, Nalu Prossy, gathered together 18 people to prepare them to start and run their own businesses. Nalu, a Spirit in Action Small Business Fund local coordinator in eastern Uganda, is soft-spoken and hard-working, and when I met her this summer in Kenya, she told me that this work “is in my heart, I have that spirit of helping others.” Nalu Prossy shows us some of the baskets made by SIA business owners in Uganda. This new round of small business owne

Saul (Malawi) was able to expand his crop of green maize with a SIA grant. Have you heard about “angel investors”? In the business world, Angel Investors are wealthy, entrepreneurial-minded individuals who provide capital to start-up companies. Now, imagine a world where Angel Investors didn’t just back Silicon Valley tech start-ups. Actually, aren’t SIA donors already Angel Investors for small business entrepreneurs in Africa? “No successful company in the U.S. started with

How much a difference can $150 really make? While visiting Kenya and Malawi, Boyd and I saw many thriving businesses established through the Spirit in Action Small Business Fund. Read on to learn more about this life-changing program. 1. What is the SIA Small Business Fund (SBF) and how does it work? The Small Business Fund (SBF) is SIA’s program to support economic development in developing countries. SIA has supported 445 small businesses in Kenya, Malawi, DR Congo, Rwanda,

‘I tell you the truth, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of mine, you did for me.’ –Matthew 25:40 Part of our mission at SIA is to serve God by empowering others. The passage above clearly states that, indeed, the best way to serve God is to help others, especially those in need. In the Bible parable, those who helped did so by providing clothing, caring for the sick, and visiting those in prison. Prison officers and their wives enjoy Moringa-enriched me

In February Brasswell and Felista Nkhonjera received a SIA grant to build a Training Center to teach people in their community about bio-intensive gardening. Their goal for this project is: “To improve the living condition for the orphans and needy widows through enhancing capacity for bio-intensive gardening to improve food security and mitigation disaster effects for their families.” They are working together with members of their community to build the Training Center and

I have received some wonderful photos from SIA Small Business Fund Coordinator Godfrey Matovu in Uganda. Here are some pictures of the training and prayer meeting that Godfrey held for the groups before they receive their $150 small business grants from SIA. The training includes choosing a group leader, budgeting, reinvesting and long-term planning. The groups are also prayer groups. Thank you SIA supporters and volunteers! [Click on the picture for a larger version.] Women