RIC-NET NEWS

Voicing the Silence Campaign- be our companion

2012-02-01T16:58:00.001+03:00

Voice the Silence and cry aloud against corruption and poor service delivery by our leaders and companies.

Save lives from the condemnation of invisible death.

"Rushwa ni Adui ya maendeleo" or "Corruption is an enemy to development"

Are you aware of this:

1.1 billion people in developing countries have inadequate access to water.
2.6 billion people lack basic sanitation.
30,000 children die each day due to poverty, that's 210,000 a week, and almost 11 million per year.

And they “die quietly in some of the poorest villages on earth, far removed from the scrutiny and the conscience of the world. Being meek and weak in life makes these dying multitudes even more invisible in death.”

At any given time, half the people in developing nations are suffering from health problems caused by water and sanitation deficits.

Source: http://www.globalissues.org

Share this with a friend and talk with your leader to change this trend.

RIC-NET OFFERS TECHNICAL SUPERVISION TO INFORMATION CENTERS

2012-01-31T12:17:00.006+03:00

On the early morning of Friday 27th 2012, RIC-NET staff ; (program manager, Finance officer, Documentation officer, ICT personnel and Assistant Information officer) set off for kamwenge Communities’ Information Centre (KACOICE) located in kamwenge town . The team was welcomed by centre members who were eagerly waiting for their arrival. A brief meeting was held with the centre members to discuss issues affecting the centre; achievements, challenges and way forward. The members appreciated RIC-Net support extended to them such as capacity building, financial support among others.

Through interactions with staff and board members, the team learnt about the progress of the centre in the last three months as they had been boasted with funding from HIVOs through RIC-NET which have facilitated a set up of a KACOICE sign post

for visibility purposes, daily newspapers availed to the readers from which articles relevant to the farmers are photocopied and shared with the farmers being that they are the majority of the users, the centre had so far shared information on bee keeping, pineapple growing, poultry, diversification in agriculture among others

The centre had also collected about 1000 telephone numbers from stakeholders to facilitate information sharing using the bulk SMS, the RIC-NET staff did a lot of orientation done in this area as most members interacted with had a thinking SMS alerts are always generated by the technical staff at RIC-NET but later they realized that since they are placed at the grassroot most of the times the SMS alerts would come from them as the technical team sends them.
Noting that KACOICE has subcounty level centers, the team also had an opportunity to visit one of them located in Nyabbani subcounty known as Nyarwe mixed farmers, where they appreciated the success stories shared in the newsletters but further requested RIC-NET to make a Documentary of their work on pineapple growing and the best practices which could inspire other farmers at regional and national level.

However, the members addressed the following issues to RIC-NET; they needed training on the use of online platforms(blogs,skype,D’groups) website for their center, repackaging their information and some skills in handling computer related programs of which RIC-NET pledged to fulfill as it has always done in the past.

INFORMATION OFFICERS’ REFLECTION MEETING ENDS SUCESSFULY

2012-01-30T15:13:00.004+03:00

RIC-NET on Friday 20th January 2012 had a reflection meeting of information officers from all information centers/points in the Rwenzori region. These centers include the following; Kabarole Information Centre (KIC), Bwera Information Centre (BIC), Cemuliki Information Centre (CIC), Kyegegwa Rural Information Centre (KRIC),Busongora Rural Information Centre (BRIC), Mwenge Rural Information Centre (MRIC), and Kamwenge Community Information Centre (KACOICE). Each center was at least represented by either one or two officers.

Objectives of the reflection meeting were to learn from experience and good practices of information centers / points; find out issues/complaints arising from communities that shall form a basis for community dialogue meetings to engage leaders and community members for social accountability. The members freely shared information on activities they have been doing which was quit interesting. A number of issues emerged and respective officers concerned were asked to make further investigations and gather reliable data to be considered in the future for community dialogue meetings. Most of the issues/complaints raised in the region were concerning inadequate water supply, food security, education, NAADS, and inadequate medical services.

A number of success stories were shared, for instance, in Kyarusandara sub-county-Kasese district, there was a problem of water shortage which had put the lives of residents at stake; BRIC held community meeting with the sub-county leaders and demanded for clean and regular water supply. The community members pledged to participate in digging trenches. Leaders and community members worked jointly to arrest water crisis in the area. As per now the people in the sub-county are enjoy clean water. Most information officers also reported that they have been collecting sub-county work plans, and approved budgets and sharing it with the community members through public notice boards and meetings which has accelerated vigilance of the members to critically monitor development activities in their areas for social accountability. Most information officers reported that they had collected and submitted a number of telephone numbers to RIC-NET head office to be entered in the bulky sms data base, one of the tools RIC-NET uses to collect and disseminate information to the general public.

The members enjoyed nice but short reflection, as the day came to an end when they still wished to continue the discussion. In his closing remarks, the Executive Director, Mr. John M. Silco, encouraged the members to work hard and fulfill all the duties assigned and report accordingly. He urged the members to always design their work plan according to the proposal and contract made in order to avoid misuse of funds and ensure that any spending is in line with the project being implemented and they clearly defend it.

INFORMATION IS ALL YOU NEED TO DEMAND FOR YOUR ENTITLEMENTS

2012-01-30T10:17:00.004+03:00

The more the better, the stronger they are made, the more effective they will be. It is a chain, intertwined together, complementing each other’s role at different levels; regional, District, County, Sub County, and Parish levels. This chain of Information Centers and points at the different society levels has curbed the traditional challenge of limited access to information by the community since the main business of these points is information sourcing and sharing/dissemination. Located in Kabarole, RIC-NET is complimented by eight County Information Centers and several Information Points across the Rwenzori region that she routinely supports in their information sharing work.
On a very cold Tuesday Morning of 24.01.12 at 7:30am, RIC-NET staff (Information Officer, ICT Officer, Finance Officer, Videographer and the Program Manager) set off for Kasese to visit their information Centers and Points and to also conduct an evaluation exercise of their work. It was a new day, and duty was calling unfortunately the team although present and ready for duty still looked sleepy. On and on the driver, drove, while members remained silent and yawned one after another till they reached their first destination; Bwera Information Center (BIC). At BIC,

the RIC-NET team met a hospitable and vibrant team of six members (Zaverio-BIC Information Officer, Muhesi and Happy from KALI, Abdu from RWECO among others). Key among the things discussed was the social accountability program that BIC is implementing. The team shared that since August last year BIC together with KALI embarked on monitoring “Amaizi Marungi” Gravity Flow Scheme in Mpondwe-Lhubiriha Town Council as a response to several complaints from the community about the continued lack of water despite the Scheme’s said completion. Several findings ranging from lack of water, non functional water scheme, lack of source attendants and nonpayment of the acting source attendants for around two years to use of small sizes of water pipes as opposed to the project design were discovered and are being compiled into a report to be shared during a Stakeholders meeting on 15.02.12. This sharing was supplemented by a mountain climbing field visit to the water source in question at Isango- Kitholhu Sub County to verify the previous monitoring findings and to also establish the current status of the scheme.
Following this, the team then hit the hot and dusty road to one of BIC’s Information Points; Kayanza Information Point. Despite the Information Point’s location at the Lakeside, it was so hot and the place looked long deserted. The air smelt of dust, fish and the sweat of the ever busy fishermen and women. With the presence of largely small and congested semi-permanent old buildings it is almost impossible for one to believe that the population of people at this landing site is of over 1500 people. Nevertheless, this atmosphere did not seem to deter the visiting team, it rather interested them to learn more about the impact of the information services offered by BIC in such a setting. In a meeting with the Information Point’s members who included the Information Point’s Chairman Mr. Bwambale Kasuki, his Executive, some members of the Point and the area LCI, the team learnt that the presence of BIC coupled with the support she gives to this Information Point together with the different information services she offers have transformed the lives, minds, thoughts and actions of the community in Kayanza. Being the only Information Point in the community everyone looks up to it for information on what is going on in their Constituency and beyond. Explaining BIC’s contribution, the Chairman asserted thus “I am now computer literate because of BIC, I thank her for all the computer trainings members of my Information Point have been taken through. I additionally thank BIC for the TV and other related equipments that she has supported us with; from these my community has been kept abreast with what is going on in the country and beyond. It is interesting how lots of people, young and old, female and male throng the TV room at the news hours especially “NTV Akawungezi” at 7:00pm to listen to the news”. According to the Chairman, this has facilitated civic empowerment now being witnessed in the community’s active participation in development programs like planning meetings and the monitoring of the services offered at the primary school, and the HCII especially the use of PHC funds. However, the members noted a few challenges like the lack of funds to buy daily newspapers for the community and the lack of adequate, translated and relevant information. He appealed to RIC-NET and BIC to source for, translate and share with them information on HIV/AIDs prevention and management, fish farming, agriculture, and education among others. Besides Kayanzi Information Point, BIC in total has 16 Information points spread across Bukonzo West and East Constituencies. This marked the end of a long, interesting and educative day one as members retired to their homes and Hotel rooms.
Come 25.01.112, it was day two. The sun shone so hot and brightly that one would think it was 2:00pm when actually it was just 8:30am. So much to expect ahead; dust, heat, thirst and lots of interesting people as well. Without wasting time, the RIC-NET team drove to Busongora Information Center (BRIC) in Base Camp-Kasese Municipality where it met the Center’s Chairperson Mr. Isingoma Patrick and a few other members. Patrick informed the team that the Center was managing although with several challenges. He noted that the Center under the Social Accountability program last year (2011) monitored service delivery in Kyabarungira and Bugoye Sub Counties with particular focus on Rwesande HCIV, and Kabatunda HCIII. Monitoring findings about these institutions have been compiled and are yet to be shared with the different stakeholders.
The visit did not stop at the main Center; Patrick later led the team to some of BRIC’s Information Points located within the Community. Katooke Rural, Kabagaga and Kyabarungira Information points in Bugoye and Kyabarungira Sub Counties were among those visited during this exercise. At Katooke Rural Information Point the
Chairperson one Ms. Biira Evacate revealed that the quickest and most effective way that the members use to pass Information to the Community is through Music, Dance and Drama. She noted that, “at the inception of this point there was a lot of reluctance and lack of interest in the Information Point’s services, this forced us to change our strategy and we formed the Katooke Actors Group for Entertainment that we now use to reach out to the community. We stage shows on key development concerns in the community like how to curb corruption in the health sector. We do this monthly from one parish to another, and we usually stage on Sunday afternoon when most people are known to be free. This strategy has pushed us from the initially 20% population of people we were serving to around 60% now”. Just like Kayanza Information Point, Katooke Information Point appealed for more translated information on Youth activities/programs, education, farming and health among others.
Interestingly at Kyabarungira Information Point, RIC-NET met a team of around 25 members, out which only one member was female. Besides this, 80% of the members were elderly. Sounds boring, huh? Wait a minute, this was a very vibrant and empowered team which had, for your information, actively monitored service delivery at their HC- Kyabarungira HC III and even compiled a report which they are planning to share with their leaders to indicate their dissatisfaction in the quality of services offered at the Center. I learnt one thing, that, no matter how old you are, it takes just the right information to spur the energy in you to demand for your entitlements. It is evident that the various information received and shared at this Point amongst the members and the community has left many informed, empowered and ready to be instruments of change within their own Communities.
General Observations and Recommendations.
I observed that there is a lot of hunger and need for information by the community than the Information Centers and Points are providing; and that the little information that the Centers have provided has most often remained unutilized by the largely semi-illiterate population because it is most often in English. I suggest that more efforts should be devoted to understanding the information needs of the community and translating the required information by the community to familiar languages if greater impact must be registered.
Lastly I also observed that the use of multimedia pulls more people and appeals to many as opposed to the literature that we most often congest our libraries with.

RIC-NET SETS UP DATA CENTER AT DENIVA, TRAINS STAFF

2012-01-25T18:05:00.004+03:00

In the same spirit of promoting social accountability and increased access to information, CEW-IT through RIC-NET set up a data center at DENIVA head offices in Kampala on 17th Jan 2012. DENIVA Staff thereafter was trained in the use of E-plat forms on the 18th Jan 2012.
ICT CEWIT CU-Emmanuel Oluka took DENIVA staff through an over view of the Uchaguzi platform that was used during the 2011 elections. He showed them how it was used.
The essence of this was to introduce them to the HUDUMA platform that is going to be used during the social accountability project. He explained to the participants that Huduma is a Kiswahili word meaning “service delivery”. He said that this is being harmonized together with other partners in Kenya called Sodnet.
Emma went ahead elaborating that this platform was going to work just like the Uchaguzi platform. Members of public (Citizens) will be sending messages to 6333 a short code that is yet to be procured and those messages would be approved, sent and flagged to different people responsible for address. And that these messages will capture and focus on 5 major issues in the project namely;
 Water
 NAADS
 Health
 Education among others
The Huduma platform was discussed in details.
The Executive director RIC-NET further led the participants in the use of other e-platforms for easy communication and information sharing. Among others was the use of blogs where one was created for DENIVA, use of skype.

This was yet another session that members enjoyed and signed up for some of these e-platforms. LCDs (projectors) were later handed over to DENIVA for her the other data centers that are yet to be set up soon.

YES WE CAN!

2012-01-23T10:28:00.003+03:00

Hurriedly they walked as if to catch up with something very precious that they wouldn’t dare to lose. One by one, young and old, women and men all gathered under the mango trees that offered a beautiful shade and breeze to its inhabitants.
Slowly the number swelled, mothers hurriedly breastfed and made simple makeshift beds for their babies so they wouldn’t disturb, while the men artistically arranged the venue for the meeting. With peaceful faces they all sat murmuring greetings to each other waiting for the set time 3:00pm. And finally the Clock struck 3:00pm, thirty two out of the expected fourty six people had gathered so far. Members prayed and sang the National and Toro Kingdom Anthems; it was now time for the Citizens’ Parliament, call it Neighborhood Assembly if you like.
IWDP had on this day 18.01.12 organized an assembly for her first group called Nyankwanzi People’s Voice. (RIC-NET supported this activity with documentation expertise).
Chaired by the group’s Chairperson Mr. Madhivani Moses, members (who included teachers, farmers, business persons, students and politicians) discussed issues that affect them in their communities in the sectors of NAADs, Health and Education. Several service delivery challenges were raised and a number of solutions to them were also suggested;
NAADs
Procurement and supply of poor quality enterprises; members noted that at the inception of the program, the community was informed that NAADs was going to introduce new and better breeds of animals and crops unfortunately nothing has changed, all enterprises are procured locally from the same old breeds. Accordingly the spread of crop pests and diseases has remained a challenge. Sharing her experience one, Hadija revealed that the NAADs banana suckers she received in 2010 came with Banana bacterial wilt that has since eaten up her entire plantation, “I regret why I accepted these suckers because they brought me diseases that I didn’t have before…”

Lack of adequate knowledge on the selection of beneficiaries and enterprises was also noted amongst the community. This was revealed in the various complaints by the members like the neglect of the poor and disadvantaged persons and their appeal for different enterprises like coffee.
Lack of supervision and follow up of NAADs beneficiaries by the NAADs officials, supply of inadequate enterprises viza viz the beneficiaries prepared land and limited involvement/ interest of some community members in groups.
Members appealed for more sensitization of the community on the NAADs program and the change of strategy of the supply of enterprises from group to individual. Explaining this one Jackson Mugarura asserted that the supply should target individuals and that Government could put measures to either arrest or punish those individuals who will not have utilized the enterprise as expected “I personally believe that this would increase the number of beneficiaries and also ensure uniformity in the program”
Commenting on these concerns the area Councilor to the Sub County Hon. Rubongoya Atuha thanked members for raising such pertinent challenges which he pledged to share with Council in their next Council Session. He appreciated the fact that NAADs has a number anomalies, although on the other hand, the community is to blame for the poor performance of the project; Hon. Rubongoya explained that there is still continued limited ownership of the enterprises and the program by the community and limited will and boldness in holding their leaders accountable. He informed the meeting that service delivery is two way- demand driven, and as such the community should be able to walk to the offices of their leaders and demand for information on issues of concern to them.
Health
Several issues were also raised about Nyankwanzi HCIII, these ranged from inadequate staffing, poor relationship between health workers and patients, frequent drug stock outs especially septrines, continued failure to follow first come, first serve basis when handling patients, lack of confidentiality by health workers in the HIV/AIDs department- they gossip about their patients in the community, and keeping of patients for long hours yet they send them away at the end of the day without drugs. Wholesomely members appealed for immediate intervention of the Sub County and relevant development partners into the appalling situation at the HC.
Education.
Members regretted to note that the Sub County was still doing badly in terms of academic performance; other challenges included lack of staff houses at schools, high pupil and teacher absenteeism, inadequate facilities in schools, inadequate teacher salaries and inadequate parents’ contribution/support towards education programs among others. About this, members appealed to government to consider increasing teachers’ salaries and construction of staff houses at schools if their performance must be improved. Commenting on these concerns, Hon. Rubongoya equally challenged the parents to find it within their priorities to send their children to school effective 30.01.12 and to support education programs.
Summing up the discussions, one of the discussants Mugarura Jackson thanked IWDP for this initiative of bringing citizens together to deliberate on issues affecting them, he revealed that he is optimistic that this initiative is going to cause positive change in Nyakwanzi Sub County. He however challenged the political leaders to use/maintain the energy, time and money they invest in soliciting for votes during elections when offering services to the community.
Conclusively it should be noted that this was a practical forum; active participation of the community members was witnessed/realized. From this I learnt one thing; that the solutions to development challenges are within us- the community, and to this bottom- up planning needs to be revamped if effective and quick development must be attained.

I feel compelled to thank IWDP and all the other members that have already started implementing the lessons they learnt from their study visit to Kakamego-Kenya in 2011 about Neighborhood Assemblies. I am optimistic that these assemblies will facilitate increased community participation in development programs and cause consequent improved service delivery in the community.
Neighbourhood Assemblies, way to go!

RIC-NET ACHIEVES A REFLECTION OF ISSUES, DIET AND MUSCLES

2012-01-12T10:26:00.005+03:00

RIC-NET staff have accomplished a three day reflection meeting at kasunga. The meeting commenced on 4th January 2012 at kasunga training conference resort in Kyenjojo District where staff members gathered for a three (3) days reflection meeting last week.

Different issues were shared, and resolutions made on what should be implemented that was laid down in a document to be used by all RIC-NET departments for 2012 work schedules.

The three days meeting, staff had the opportunity to reflect on the achievements of the past year 2011, the lessons learn t and areas of improvement which finally formed the annual report. Also during the meeting staff came up with an annual work plan for the year 2012.

It was not only a time of academic book warm but a reflection on diet and relaxation of muscles by staff members exercising the freedom to brainstorm on their personal issues eating and refreshments, making physicals, and enjoying the clear breeze of Kasunga environment.

While closing the meeting, the chairperson board of directors Rev Isaiah muchunguzi appreciated the efforts of the ED with the entire staff for managing, directing and selling RICNETs image to the Rwenzori community and the entire nation.

RWECO FORMS THE FIRST EKYAGHANDA KYABATAKA IN KASESE DISTRICT

2012-01-11T16:31:00.006+03:00

Community members of Nyakiyumbu subcounty in Kasese District on Monday 9th 2012 witnessed the first formation of the ekyangahanda kyabataka which would be translated as the citizens ’ forum. The activity was organized under the citizens manifesto in action project as a platform where citizens would regularly meet and inform leaders of their development concerns.
Through the Rwenzori consortium for civic competence RWECO, a consortium of Rwenzori information Centers Network (RIC-NET), Integrated women Development program, (IWDP), karambi action for life improvement (KALI) and Good hope foundation for rural development (GHFRD). Karambi Action for life improvement organized the function that led to a full house attendance at the kalongoghire catholic church, Nyakiyumbu subcounty among the participants were KALI & RWECO staff, CSO representatives, religious leaders, community members, the community development officer, the sub county chief and LCIII chairperson

Two staff of RIC-NET participated in the meeting where they documented the proceedings of the day.
According to the Executive Director KALI Ms. Katusabe Beatrice, the organization identified the Ndongo anti poachers association as the community based organization through which the ekyangahanda kyabataka or the citizens’ social forum would be promoted as the citizens will have meetings on issues concerning them and task leaders to address their concerns.

Among the priority concerns raised by the participants that need to be addressed by the leaders were water, roads, sustainability of the Citizens social forum, market access for the farmer produce of which they agreed to invite the respective leaders as the sub county agriculture officer, the secretary for works at the subcounty. The participants also managed to elect Mr. Bwambale Zerubabel as the speaker for the Citizens social forum by the end of the day.

HUMAN RIGHTS ACTIVISTS CALLED UPON TO DEFEND THE RIGHTS OF PWDS

2011-12-20T16:55:00.003+03:00

Most people regard disability to be a curse, said the chairperson of NUDIPU, during a workshop that took place on 15th Dec 2011 at hotel Africana.
The workshop was a follow up of another workshop that took place in May for human rights defenders and activist on how they have mainstreamed disability within their work.
He called upon all represented organizations to come up and defend the rights of PWDS.
A number of presentations were made during the workshop one of which was on understanding the best practices in mainstreaming disability .This was presented by Mr.Lukabwe Fred from Enhance initiative, he gave a highlight of the best practices in mainstreaming disability as;
•Need for an organization to Recognize disability
•Non discrimination,
•Equity and fairness, in terms of service delivery accessibility and information sharing.
•Care and support, an organization should give most utmost passion for disabled people
•Health working environment
•Social dialogue: when addressing PWDS, one should avoid talking to but should talk to.
He also went ahead to give processes of mainstreaming as engagement, access, resources and enforcement.
By the end of the training participants were called upon to form a coalition which will act as an umbrella to promoting the rights of PWDS.

CITIZENS OF RWENZORI REGION VOW TO FIGHT CORRUPT CIVIL SERVANTS.

2011-12-07T17:10:00.003+03:00

Citizen Representatives of the Rwenzori region aired out their views on the on-going corruption in the country. This was during the Launching of Anti-Corruption week organized by Rwenzori Anti-Corruption Coalition [RAC] at Kagote SDA hall in Fort-Portal Municipality under the theme “A just and corrupt free society” with mission “to contribute to poverty reduction in the Rwenzori region by empowering citizens to expose and cause action against corruption”. RIC-NET is part of this fight against corruption through the program of Social Accountability.

The citizens showed their dissatisfactions on how; police fuel corruption by taking position in some cases, that even some cases in the community are not investigated for example the case in BUFUNGO sub county kyenjonjo where a couple killed each other, in some circumstance investigations are just minimal giving ground for the court to throw out cases, and police investigation favour the rich.
Similarly; the Judiciary favour special people e.g. Anti-corruption cases,

Government also have been supportive of people close and or related to government officials or the president. Yet “Mr. Museveni talks about zero tolerance to corruption. Later when he went to Rwanda, he declared that his Government was surrounded by thieves”

“Justice delayed is justice denied”, the judiciary is no longer independent from the Government. This is evidenced in the cases the IPP or the IGG have taken to court and later withdraw cases due to lack of sufficient evidence. Why are the people involved in gross corruption left unpunished but those with cases of 1000 or less punished? Why is the government siding with the people engaged in mass corruption e.g. Hon.Muhwezi, Hon.Mbabazi? Other cases like Uganda Vs Mugabi Pius and two other Ref.IGG FP/CF/03/09.Does the government understand the citizen manifesto about combating corruption?

RIC-NET STAFF PARTICPATES IN CAPACITY BUILDING WORKSHOP ON TSA IN NAIROBI

2011-12-06T10:53:00.010+03:00

Technology for Accountability and Transparency (TSA) initiatives are increasing becoming common in East Africa.
several CSOs are having initiatives that creates a platform for citizens to voice their concerns and demand improved service delivery. In Kenya, SODNET has created an action that is already creating a lot of impact in getting leaders and government officers.The initiative dubbed HUDUMA, is a citizens’ initiative of Social Development Network (SODNET) in partnership with USHAHIDI. www.huduma.info

The goal of the strategy is to contribute to the improvement of service delivery by providing simple technology/media based tools and channels to amplify citizens concerns, displeasure, complaints, or suggestions on their perceptions on service delivery by duty bearers.

Huduma intends to nurture more vibrant a more vibrant citizenry that is able to make demands for improved service delivery, more accountability and robust democratization process through increased grassroots participation.

The channels allow citizens to report a number of issues or complaints e.g. lack of water, medicines, potholes, lack of teachers, to an Huduma channel, mostly an SMS number (3018). The conversation, including feedback, are managed through the Huduma channels

The initiative initially focused on six counties, namely Nairobi-Langata, Muranga, Bungoma, Kisumu and Pokot, but it has now expanded to other areas of Kenya and is currently being scaled up in other countries. In each country, the action will work with professional groups as a means of verifying citizens’ demands.

The initiative has already began to create demands for improved service delivery and has been attracting participation from different areas of the country from citizens who are keen to voice concerns. This has been witnessed in Langata in Nairobi and in other regions where those in authority have been able to respond to citizens queries.

As part of the efforts to upscale it in Kenya and in the Eastern Africa Region, SODNET has recently organized a capacity building workshop which drew participants from Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Rwanda, Burundi and Ethiopia at Nairobi's Methodist Guest House , on December 2-3, 2011 to which the John Silco from RIC-NET and Emanuel Oluka from CEW-IT and Mugisha Celestine participated. RWECO- RICNET team shared with other participants the Uganda TSA initiatives in Uganda and platforms as Uchaguzi -Uganda, Rwenzori peoples voice and Citizens voice. www.citizensvoice.ug

INFORMATION SHARING CAUSES ACTION TOWARDS SOCIAL ACCOUNTABILITY.

2011-12-02T14:57:00.005+03:00

Information is any relevant news or data or facts gathered, processed and analyzed and shared with other stake holders who include among others; the farmers, health officer, political leader, teachers religious leader and members of Public. The role of information officers is to identify such silent issues in the society that can be amplified. The training took place on 28th November at RIC-Net head office in fort Portal.

The focus of the training was how the information we gather can speak out and influence change in the communities where we work. The main facilitator Ms Alice Mushenene Mbayahi mentioned that “what makes good information is the 5W’s”. Information should have content, evidenced based, having facts and based on the community are facing. Information should be shared and should emphasize on a single issue for action to be realize.

She emphasized on the methods of gathering information as observation, discussions, interview and dialogue. Information officer should easily identify the sources, monitor the project or issues in the community, share with other stakeholders, and identify the local government development project cycle.
In doing all this, it was realized that the entry point is important in information sourcing. Create a good social relationship with people, write a simple description of the issue, make follow-ups’ and if no action is done then engage the community in the issue before a dialogue with the authority can be organized.

By the end of the training, the information officers agreed that in order to cause change in the community, there is a great need to develop interest in serving the community, share timely information, improve the means of communication, improve our resource centers with timely information and engage our leaders to practically be accountable to the community they are serving.

ARUA TOWN,A PLACE TO BE

2011-12-01T15:37:00.002+03:00

It was a bright sunday morning that the RIC-NET team led by the Executive Director, set off for a journey to Northern Uganda to conduct a training in e-platforms and maintenance at CEFORD offices in Arua . A night in Arua was so enjoyable at Heritage Courts where there was a Karaoke night and on top of that it was also a comedy night, despite language barrier we managed to pick few words through the help of an interpreter.

Having had a tremendous night at heritage hotel, early Monday, the team headed to CEFORD office where the training was to take place. The training kicked off at 9:30am with ICT Emma taking members through Uchaguzi ,citizen voice and RIC-NET ED,John silco took members in skype,blogs,how to operate a projector where as Betty took them through computer maintenance tips . CEFORD team was one of the active one as everyone was mesmerized in gaining ICT skills.The training ended late in the evening with Ricnet ED handing over a projector to Ceford Executive Director madam Jean.

TODAY IS WORLD AIDs DAY,WHAT CAN WE CHANGE

2011-12-01T15:34:00.008+03:00

CHILD HIV BECOMING A GROWING PROBLEM
Over 150,000 Ugandan children below the age of 14 are infected with HIV/AIDs according to a study by UNICEF. Pediatric cases are becoming a growing problem in Uganda where mother- to -child transmission is still a concern, and medical facilities struggle to provide adequate treatment throughout the country.
A major issue is that HIV progresses much faster in children than it does in adults. If a positive infant is left untreated for two years they face a 50% mortality rate, making early testing vital to an infant’s survival if caught early and treated immediately the child is likely to live a normal life.
“All care and treatment can only be given if they are first tested. Testing is the only entry point for care”, says Dr. Peter Elyanu, program officer pediatric HIV care and treatment at the ministry of health.
Six weeks after birth is considered the ideal time for testing because the DNA PCR test, which looks for particles of the virus in the blood, is almost effective at this time. The six week point also coincides with the child’s first set of immunizations.
Although cases are considered pediatric, until the age of, children are able to give their consent for testing at the age of 12 and the ministry of health encourages parents to tell their children the status by the age of 10. In the case that results are positive, there are special counseling methods used for children that differ from the one-on-one basis consultations given to adults. “Children easily communicate their emotional status through activities like drawing “said Elyanu
They don’t respond well to direct questions so we use methods like storytelling and play.
All hospitals, health centres IVs and health centers IIIs can test children.

CIVIL SOCIETY ORGANISATIONS VIEWS ON THE IMPLICATIONS OF OBSERVANCE OF RIGHTS FROM OIL EXPLORATION IN UGANDA

2011-11-30T16:57:00.002+03:00

LEGAL AND HUMAN RIGHTS DIMENSION OF OIL AND GAS IN EXPLORATION IN UGANDA.
Is oil and Gas “curse” in Uganda, or we suffer from the “Dutch Disease”. These were the words of the participants at the workshop to understand the link between the Oil and how the community rights can be realized and protected and how CSO’s can create awareness about Oil in the community. The workshop was organized by HURRINET UGANDA. Participants were from different CSO’s operating in the Ruwenzori region.Ric-net staff to attended and share the following as observation from a one day workshop.
Introduction of Oil exploration in Uganda.
The exploration begun in 1920 up to 1952. In 1983 Oil exploration resumed and led to the creation of Petroleum Unit of 1985 and the subsequent petroleum Act. During this period a lot of survey was done about Oil but little realized. In 1993, regulations were passed to regulate petroleum activities and later Government started to market these resources. This has led to the current exploration activities taking place in Uganda.
The areas having Oil in Uganda are; the Albertine Graben, the Hoima Basin, the Kioga Basin,kadama area,L.Wamala basin and Victoria basin. High potential of Ugandans Oil is embedded in the Albertine Basin which stretches from West Nile towards Kisoro.It borders DRC through the several ecosystems.
The status for licensing of Oil in Uganda as; Block 1 Pakwach basin to Heritage Oil and Tullow ,Block 2 Albert Basin to Tullow, Block 3A Semulik basin to Heritage-Tullow and Block 4c to Dominion.62 wells have been drilled and 58 are having Oil, this make it 92%success rate. The quality of Ugandan Oil is Medium value in solid state with low Gas ratio and about 2.5 billion barrows discovered. Uganda Plans to build the refinery in kabala-Bullisa districts.
Legal and Human rights frame work in Uganda as far as Oil is concerned.
The constitution of Uganda talk about the ownership as provided in the Article 26 (constitutional provision and amendment) “all mineral and petroleum in, on or under any land or water in Uganda are vested in the Government on behalf of the republic of Uganda”. Why the government of Uganda and Republic at the same time brings concern that it belongs to the Ministers and the President.
But Article 26 of the constitution guarantee the right to own property and land being part, but the same land can be taken by the Government for the purpose of Public use. This same Article has been used in Bullisa to evict the people from their land. Section 5/3 of the land acquisition Act requires a person having an interest in such land to “state the amount and the particular” and their claim for compensation of those interests. But such have been challenged by Ignorance of the local people, land grabbing, and low value of money on the side of the peasants above all the payment taking time to be realized.
The grazing and cultivation rights seem not taken into account especially Article 37 which talks about the right to practice and cultural practice as grazing. But the concern was how the cattle in the grazing community were taken into consideration during this eviction process. The petroleum Act Section 39 talks about the same.
The environmental Impact Assessment especially section 20(I) entails the company to carry out study and submit a statement to NEMA. The statement shall be Public document which may be inspected which could be done through public hearings, meetings interviews
Right to clean and health environment should be taken into consideration. Article 39 of the constitution and the petroleum Act section 31 obliges a licensee to mitigate and prevent damages that may harm the environment or its inhabitants
The transparency matters were taken into account as outlined in the right to access information as one way to be transparent. Article 41 of the constitution is cognizant of one right to access information. Also the Access to information Act of 2005, but it was realized that the PEP Act of 1985 contravene the above and some of the by-laws in the contracts between Uganda and the Oil companies make some information to be taken as classified thus denying he citizens the right to free access to information.
Other legal rights observed were the right to work. This is seen from Article 7 of the International Covenant of Economic social and cultural rights. It talks about the right to favourable conditions of work, safe and health working conditions. Article 40(2) of the constitution provides for right to work and is in conformity with the above.

………………………………To be continued

FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS TO BOOST AGRO-BUSINESS ENTREPRISES

2011-11-29T16:02:00.004+03:00

Financial institutions have revealed the opportunity available for farming groups and Agriculture cooperatives to improve, develop and modernize Agricultural production. This was revealed by most Micro-Finance and Bankers representatives during the Agri-Finance market place meeting that took place at Kagote Hall from 24th -25th November 2011.

The meeting was organized by Agri-Pro focus Uganda to address the information gap that exists among farmers on the financial products and services available in the market. The aim of the event was to support the development of smallholder agri-business by supporting access to financial services and credit.

Over 15 financial institutions in Rwenzori region represented at the meeting and shared their financial obligations to Increase agricultural productivity by rendering financial services and credit to agro-business enterprises at affordable interest rates, and in different categories ranging from farm in puts like; seeds and fertilizers, post harvest infrastructure and storage Facilities for the produce among others. According to Isingoma John Baptist officer in charge of Agriculture Centenary bank , the accepted security for acquiring an agriculture loan include; Land titles, Land agreements, animals, Households, and any asset like cars and Moto cycles.

The most cited challenge that affects the relationship of micro-finance institutions with agricultural practitioners was the seasonality of agriculture products with high risks of production that diminish the profitability of agriculture, in turn affecting the payment of farmers credit to MFIs. It’s on this argument that Hon. Aston Kajora minister for Investment encouraged farmers to form or Join Agro-Business cooperatives and Farming groups to broaden their capacity to secure and finance credit easily, increase on productivity, storage and marketing of their agricultural products.

Product display was one of the activities of the meeting. Cocoa from Bundibugyo groups, Coffee from kasese (Bukonzo Joint Cooperative), tea from Mpanga tea growers association, among others were displayed. Centenary Bank and Hofokam were awarded as the greatest financial service providers and supporters to farmers and agricultural groups at the closure of the meeting on Friday 25th November 2011.

RIC-NET TRAINS PAC AND ACORD IN E-PLATFORMS

2011-11-24T12:05:00.002+03:00

The journey started on a bright Sunday (20th Nov.2011) after noon from Kampala through the east to Soroti District where we arrived late in the evening.
On a Monday morning the RIC-NET team visited Public Affairs Center (PAC)-Uganda where we had a session of training with them in as far as the e- platforms are concerned.
Betty-ICTO RIC-NET led the participants through the Uchaguzi (http://www.uchaguzi-uganda.blogspot.com ) platform that was used during the election process. This was a review.

She was later joined by the Executive Director RIC-NET who also took the participants through a number of other online platforms like the Rwenzori Peoples' voice blog (http://rwecovoice.blogspot.com), CEW-IT (http://cewit.or.ug ), http://wwww.uchaguzi.co.ug and more blogs.

He also took participants through other information sharing platforms like the use of skype. Members signed up and started using this. Twiter was yet another communications media introduced to the members.
This was a long session characterized by practicals, questions and answers. The team carried along with them a dell projector that was officially handed over to PAC by the Executive Director RIC-NET. He took them through its procedures of operation.
ICTO-Yosia also ran some Networking maintenance for the PAC Network and made sure their wireless internet was enabled and security protected and more security issues for their router were done.

The session ended at around 3:15 pm and the team set off for Gulu at around 3:45 pm.

Bright morning of work in Gulu

2011-11-24T10:32:00.007+03:00

22nd November 2011 was yet another day of great work at ACORD-Gulu. The session that attracted a number of participants started at around 9:30 am with Betty-ICTO taking the participants through a review of the Uchaguzi platform that was used during the elections by CEW-IT.
The ED RIC-NET led the participants through a number of other ICT online platforms. Twiter , skype were too taught to the participants. This was for nothing else other than timely information sharing among members.

They (participants) signed up and they started using these tools. This was a successful tour because nearly everybody picked up the ideas.
As it is for RIC-NET to continually give ICT support the ICTO-Yosia led participants through a session of computer repair and maintenance tips.

It is believed that most computer users take small things for granted and that is why they have always had technical issues with their computers most often. So these were emphasized for members to take care of their machines just like one would clean his house or office daily so are the computers.

RAKAI, A PLACE OF MANY SIGHTS IN UGANDA

2011-11-23T18:05:00.005+03:00

On the 17th -18th November 2011, a team of RWECO, which is a consortium of four organizations, Rwenzori Information centers Network RIC-NET, Integrated Women Development Program IWDP, Karambi Action for Life improvement KALI, and Good Hope Foundation for Rural Development GHFRD, along with the CSOs from DENIVA, PAC, CEFORD & ACODE visited the Neighborhood assembly for learning purposes in kasensero landing site Rakai District

Through the Kansesero peoples voice a neighborhood assembly (N.A) takes place every two months to discuss the key development concerns with the guidance of a speaker and a composition of the elected members from the various villages referred to as members of parliament and ministers representing the thematic areas The neighborhood assembly is the first of its kind in Uganda being promoted by DENIVA in Rakai

through the existing community based organizations, during the visit, the N.A in kansensero deliberated on how to improve on the standards of Education for their children as presented by the minister of education in the N.A, whereby out of 1500 children of school going age, only 800 children were in school, being a fishing community the minister of Agriculture also presented the status of the fishermen and the challenges they were facing like poor sanitation and hygiene at the temporary stall where they had been relocated in a nutshell the community members called upon Government to act fast on commission the completed stall.
Going through Rakai the learning team enjoyed the different sights of maramagambo forest, kasensero landing site, River kagera, pastoralists communities and most of it all was the excitement in the towns of Kyotera, Kalisizo as the crowds waited to receive the kabaka of Buganda during his official visit to the place.

Delivery of ICT equipments to Kamwenge Communities Information Center

2011-11-23T11:44:00.003+03:00

On 22nd of November 2011, Kamwenge Communities Information Center (KACOICE) was one of the beneficiaries in receiving ICT equipments for a community to be equitably served with relevant and timely information for sustainable development and improved livelihood of people in Kamwenge District. The equipments were delivered by Asiimwe Emily Office Administrator and Kiiza Joy ICT- Volunteer on behalf of Rwenzori Information Centers Net Work.

On behalf of staff and board members of KACOICE, Mr. Busingye Asaph the chair man appreciated the support of Rwenzori Information Centers Network for the delivery of ICT equipments. Among the equipment received was an orange modem which will enhance information sourcing, sharing and dissemination in Kamwenge District. It was noted that they have farmers voice programme on Voice of Kamwenge Fm but it is usually short for them to share information with the community.
“Information is power” it is now a slogan in KACOICE Kamwenge District.

KASESE E-SOCIETY RESOURCE CENTRE GOVERNING COUNCIL ORIENTED

2011-11-17T11:23:00.008+03:00

In the bid to prepare for future sustainability and governance of the E-society resource center in Kasese District, RIC-NET spear headed the E-society Governing council meeting (Orientation). This was held at Rwenzori the Gardens Hotel in Kasese Municipality on 16th November 2011.
The meeting attracted all parties that compose the ESRC Governing council. Among these were representatives from the Civil society and Local government staff (civil servants) headed by the Deputy Chief Administrative Officer Kasese Mr.Asaba Wilson.
The meeting that was chaired by the A.C.A.O started at about 11:00 am with a word of prayer led by one of the RIC-Net staff.

The ACAO welcomed all members who had turned for the meeting and having responded positively towards the invitation. He also said that meeting was as a result of a previous meeting that was held at the District that came up with a resolution of orienting the Governing council about their responsibilities towards the E-society resource center.
He later gave time to the Executive Director RIC-NET to highlight a number of issues about the E-society resource center.

The ED RIC-NET started by thanking the members for having honored the call and immediately outlined the composition of the governing council as follows;
• CAO Local Government to present three members chaired by the Chief Administrative Officer (CAO)
• District Heads of departments atleast three with District Information Officer (DIO) inclusive
• Four members from the Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) with the District Network
• RIC-NET was to remain as a member but not permanent also for technical back up
The ED also lamented that the CAO was to choose two other private sector partners working in the district to be part of this governing council.
He (ED) also highlighted the roles of the Governing council. Among others were;
• Governing council be the body proposing the policies in terms of governance, sustainability and operation of the E-Society center.
• Look at future plans and recommend the kind of direction that would be suitable
• Financial management
• Ownership of the E-society
• Governing council to look at how to expand and when to expand the ESRC
• Proper maintenance of documentation of the ESRC (minutes and other documents)
The District information Officer (DIO) later sited that a number of policies were already outlined by the ED and that therefore there would be need to translate these policies into a document that would go through the Governing council for approval, discussed to the District Technical Planning Committee and later signed by the Chief Administrative Officer to be a Governing document.
He (DIO) said the document would look at the;
• Mandate
• Vision
• Objective s
• Goal
• To describe membership and the tenure of membership
• Management/Administration
• It’s operations in terms of maintenance
• Sustainability
• Resource mobilization
• Need for partnerships among others.

Later a number of reactions were raised by the participants and action points were drawn. Among others were;
Technical sub committees be formed
At least two;
Policy and business plan committees.
The session was adjourned at around 1:00 pm.
Later in the afternoon the District Executive joined led by the District Vice chairperson Hon. Naome Mbambu to have lunch with the Governing Council E-society. The group later moved to the E-society resource center for inspection.
The ICT Officer RIC-NET took the District Executive through the District online resources that is the District website www.kasese.go.ug, kasese e-library, CSOs portal, the Kasese news portal and the D-group. They appreciated all efforts right from the beginning to date.

RIC-NET CONDUCTS D-GROUP TRAINING

2011-11-17T10:59:00.004+03:00

As RIC-NET in partnership with RWECO try to improve social accountability and information sharing among the community and the leaders,a D-group training was held on the 15th Nov.2011 at the E-Society resource center in Kasese District.
The D-group or simply Discussion group is one of the online platforms administered by RIC-NET. It allows members who have signed up with it to initiate, respond and receive messages or discussion topics. The training attracted a number of participants from Kasese and Kabarole Districts Local Governments, members of the CSOs and all RWECO focal persons.
The training started at 10:00 am being facilitated by the I.C.T Officer RIC-NET who introduced members to web browsing terms since these terms were to be used most often later in the practical session of the training. He explained a number of web terms to the participants.

He was later joined by the Executive Director RIC-NET who also went through the practical session of how one can sign up or join the D-group, and advantages of this discussion group. Participants signed up with the D-group and were approved as members to this group. They (participants) were challenged not to stop at that but go ahead and initiate discussion topics and respond to those that they receive.
Members were also briefed that these discussion topics would automatically get to their e-mail in boxes as long they could have been approved by the administrator and that a member would be free to reply to that message just as he/she would reply to other e-mail messages.

Participants were also informed that they could initiate a discussion topic by sending it to dgroups@kasese.org which would later be approved by the administrator and then sent to the rest of the members. The administrator of the group reserves rights to reject a topic in as long as it may not be genuine.
The Executive Director later led participants through some other online platforms like the Uchaguzi platform, and informed them another platform has been designed called the huduma that is going to monitor service delivery. Blogging was yet another issue that was explained thoroughly.

He also informed members about the U-report that UNICEF is running. He told members to join this by sending join to 8500 and that every message sent is free of charge.
The training was successful and it was adjourned at around 2:00 pm.

Farmers in Kisinga sub county appreciate having plant clinic.

2011-11-15T10:47:00.006+03:00

“Healthy plants for a healthy future” is now the motto in Kisinga Sub-County Kasese District. Kisinga is located in Bukonzo County East. Speaking to some of the farmer’s on 11.11.11 during a field monitoring exercise of the Plant Clinic in Kisinga by the RIC-NET Community Out Reach Officer Kaliba Charles and Dr. Reeder Robert from Global Plant wise UK, the farmers expressed gratitude to RIC-NET and Asaba Wilberforce the Kisinga Plant Doctor for extending Plant Clinic services closer to them.
According to the Plant Doctor, Asaba Wilberforce, he noted that I attend to 25-35 farmers every market day and 10 farmers on a daily basis at the plant clinic in Kiburara trading center. The crops mostly affected and brought to the clinic for diagnosis are maize, mangoes, tomatoes, , beans, cassava, cotton coffee, and bananas. The farmers revealed that there biggest challenge is Banana bacterial wilt which has reduced banana production and led to continued poverty and hunger in the Sub County.
During the Plant Clinic operation, the team also learnt from the numbers of clients received that Cassava mosaic virus disease (CMD) caused by Cassava Mosaic Gemini viruses (CMGs) was the other commonest disease affecting the crops in the area second to bananas. This too has contributed to low yields at harvest time.

Besides, cassava, are beans which too are affected by Bacteria (the Black bean Aphid [Aphisfabae). that leads to stunted growth, yellowing and sometimes causes black spotting of leaves leading to extensive damage of the crops. Responding to the clients’ complaints, Dr, Reeder Robert, mentioned that currently there is no medicine to treat these cases brought to him especially the beans, bananas and cassava. He noted that Cassava mosaic cases can only be prevented by planting good and disease free stems. Dr. Reeder, advised the farmers on some best agricultural practices like planting disease free stems, suckers and seeds together with proper and timely preparation of the fields.
Other cases that were identified were on Mangoes which were observed to have black spots and splitting at a later stage. According to Mr. Muhindo, the infection had reduced yields per plant. They revealed that, previously from one mango tree, they would harvest around three basins per season but currently they harvest only one basin per season. Commenting on this, Dr.Reeder Robert explained that just as we Humans beings need daily medication attention so do plants; “We should not wait for the whole field to be destroyed before we take action” he asserted.

KABAROLE E-SOCIETY RESOURCE CENTER NOW A REALITY

2011-11-14T12:04:00.005+03:00

In the bid to enhance community participation in decision making and development processes, through facilitating easy and faster information sharing between the community and her leaders by the use of ICT, RIC-NET has set up the second E-society resource center in the Rwenzori region. This comes after a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) that was signed between Rwenzori Information Centers Network (RIC-NET) and Kabarole District Local Government for the provision of this center last month.

The first batch of the equipment was delivered to the District on 10th November 2011 at 2:00 PM by the RIC-NET ICT team. These included 5 computers, a three in one printer (Printer, photocopier and scanner), furniture (chairs and tables), a D-Link switch for the LAN set up. The equipment was received by the District Information Officer Madam Lilian Nkwenge on behalf of the District.
The second batch of more 5 computers and two fans was delivered on 11th November 2011 early in the morning and the ICT team RIC-NET went ahead to set up the Local Area Network (LAN) for the center that very morning that is continuing with configurations this morning.

She (DIO) thanked RIC-NET for having fulfilled her pledge to the District and said that this would enhance easy information sharing.
The center is not going to be a mere internet cafe’ but will have a number of online resources or platforms attached that can be accessed anywhere by any interested persons. These platforms will include the Kabarole District website that is under design by RIC-NET, the District E-library, the District news portal, CSOs portal and the D-group (discussion group) all to be maintained and updated by RIC-NET.
This center comes after a successful one that was set for Kasese District and having realized it’s benefits to the entire community, RIC-NET set up this also with all hopes that this one will also benefit the entire community of Kabarole District and be a successful project just like the one of Kasese.
The center will also enhance ICT literacy through a number of trainings to both the entire community and the District staff.

RWECO MEMBERS JOIN OTHER PARTNERS FOR A LEARNING VISIT IN KAKAMEGA, KENYA

2011-11-08T17:31:00.004+03:00

Rwenzori consortium for civic competence RWECO members joined other civil society organizations from CEFORD, ACORD, PAC, and DENIVA for a learning visit about the neighborhood assembly in Kaka mega, Kenya from 31st October 2011 to 4th November 20II
The visit was organized by CEW-IT a consortium of the above mentioned CSOs in Uganda
Objectives of the visit
• To strengthen the knowledge and skills of CEW-IT staff and affiliate CBOs on how to organize and conduct an alternative people’s parliament and other social forums
• To strengthen the knowledge and skills of the CEW-IT staff in tracking the performance of elected and appointed leaders
• To learn best practices and share experiences of how to engage elected and appointed leaders in a multiparty political dispensation
• To share experiences and best practices on how CSOs can conduct effective lobbying and advocacy in a multiparty political dispensation

The team comprised of project officers and coordinators set off on the morning of Monday 31st after a brief at the CEW-IT offices in Kampala and arrived safely on that same day
The team was received and hosted by Christian Partners Development Agency CPDA, an NGO that has implemented the neighborhood assembly for over ten years.

With the various programs ranging from governance, dairy goat farming, HIV/AIDs prevention, the Ugandan team was able to learn from the discussion and the practicals of how the neighborhood assemblies are conducted
The team visited among others the Hamisi neighborhood assembly and the dairy goat project which is hand in hand promoted in the area to improve the incomes and nutrition of the community members. It was noted that as CSOs work on governance, livelihood is an area that cannot be ignored

Present during the visit were donor representatives from Oxfam Novib and Farm Africa
With a lot learnt from Kenya, the Ugandan team also shared their experiences in implementing the citizens’ manifesto and other areas as climate change by the time we left the Kenyans were warming for a visit to the Ugandan CSOs

RIC-NET CONDUCTS ROUND TABLE MEETING WITH BUNDIBUGYO DISTRICT.

2011-11-03T11:29:00.006+03:00

On Wednesday 26 oct 2011 RIC NET team visited SEMULIKI information centre in
BUNDIBUGYO district which is operated by Mr. Wilson when at the centre, members raised their achievement to the Executive director of RIC NET Mr. john silco that, they have developed other center points in the rural area that will help in flow of information in the community.
Some funds were disbursed to them with strings attached that it should be used in operational of the project and not for personal benefits accountability shall be required in every coin spent.

After inspecting the centre RIC NET team proceeded to BUNDIBUGYO district head quarter where district chair person who gave us go ahead of the round table meeting for the E-SOCIETY that was held in the council hall
The main objective of the meeting was to ask the district to have the E-society centre and to provide room that will help district officers in and outside to have access to information in order to reduce on use of paper work. Members at the district welcomed the idea that some of them need some training that will keep them updated and become computer experts also claimed that they have that problem of access to internal information added that since they will have a blog for uploading their news that will ease their inflow of information and be on map.
John silco Executive director of RIC-NET highlighted some of the key points the E-society as
• To strengthen information sharing
• For timely access to information
• Involvement of greater majority

He gave an illustration of www.kaseseelibrary.org as channel being used by Kasese district members in sharing information.
The members raised issues concerning costs associated with the establishment of E-society, utilization of the centre by the community.
From my observation as RIC-NET staff the idea was demanding and district members were asking when the system was to be in operation. According to Executive director of RIC-NET john silco, he said it will be early next year 2012 because KABAROLE district is the one on this year’s programme.

SPEAK – OUT ON WHAT’S HAPPENING IN YOUR COMMUNITY; BE A UREPORTER NOW!!

2011-11-03T10:12:00.006+03:00

In the bid to increase youth and children’s participation in decision making, development processes and in causing positive change in Uganda, UNICEF in 2010 launched an SMs platform called Ureport.
Ureport is an SMS tool used for social development through which children and youth can participate in the development of their areas and improving Social Accountability. According to James Powell the UNICEF Ureport Project Manager, Ureport provides a platform for information sharing and an opportunity for individuals to voice out the silent issues affecting them in their communities.
Currently there are 34000 Ureporters in Uganda using the Ureport platform and more are still being recruited and or introduced to the program. In line with this, James Powell the UNICEF Ureport Project Manager on 31.10.11 to 02.11.11 visited RIC-NET Secretariat, Information Centers/points and youth groups. The purpose of the visit was to share and also introduce the Ureport program to the RIC-NET members and stakeholders in the Rwenzori region.
Five information centers (BIC, BRIC, MRIC, KRIC and Village Connect information Center), one information Point (Rwesande information point) and one youth group (Youth Empowerment Initiative-Bwera) were visited by James Powell accompanied by the RIC-NET information officer and Administrative Secretary. Over 100 people were met, introduced to Ureport and also recruited as Ureporters.
During the sharing Powell highlighted what Ureport is, the objectives and how one can become a Ureporter;“simply type on your phone Join and send to 8500, and follow instructions to register”; http://www.ureport.ug . In his remarks, Powell also noted that “this service/platform is 100% free, and we discuss issues ranging from Gender based violence, domestic violence, HIV/AIDS, early pregnancies, girl child education, employment, inflation, service delivery issues in health, education, and water sectors among others”.
Explaining more about its operations, Powell said that the Ureport platform sends out averagely two questions to Ureporters per week, and responses to these questions are shared back with the Ureporters on their Mobile Phones and other stakeholders like the different line ministries, MPs and the general public through the Daily Newspapers, Radio and Television.
Similarly, Ureporters are encouraged to routinely send in questions on development and social issues that concern/affect them in their communities. According to Powell these issues/questions are also shared with the Commissioner in Charge of Youth and Children in the Ministry of Gender, the line Ministries and the MPs as well for action.
This has helped in raising awareness about the service delivery challenges in the community amongst the leaders and also enhanced citizen engagement with them.
Precisely put, Ureport helps in amplifying the voices of the youth, children and the general public, it gives them an opportunity to speak out on what is happening in their communities across the country, and work with other community leaders to cause positive change.

Ureport- Your Voice Matters, become a Ureporter Now!

Police Vs civilian

2011-11-03T09:10:00.000+03:00

There was drama today Wednesday 2nd of November 2011, in Kyenjojo town, where a certain police woman fought with a female tailor while other two police men were just watching them fight with out intervening. This was really shocking where every one at the scene was surprised. The fight went on for some time not until the female tailor defended her self by giving a big slap to the police woman. In this case, who should have protected the other?

RICNET MONITORS HER INFORMATION CENTRES

2011-11-01T16:44:00.001+03:00

On monday 31 october 2011,RIC-NET got the chance to visit her information centres , Mwenge Rural Information centre (MRIC) within Kyenjojo District and Kyaka rural information centre(KRIC) in Kyegegwa district which the Executive Director termed as ‘INSPECTION’. The team first met Mwenge information centre members before proceeding to Kyaka,the main purpose of the meeting was to meet member organization and understand the baseline of these organization members.

From here the RIC-NET team proceeded to Kyegegwa at Kyaka rural information centre. Here the chairperson welcomed all members; he was very pleased to receive members from RIC-NET. During this meeting the ED RIC-NET expressed his concern of poor communication between the centre and RIC-NET,he advised KRIC to always put any communication in writing than verbal .The meeting ended successfully and a cheque of 600,000 Uganda shillings was handed over to the Cordinator KRIC . These funds were to facilitate the information officer in information sourcing,packaging and dissemination.

RICNET PRESENTS E-SOCIETY CONCEPT AT TPC KYENJOJO.

2011-11-01T14:21:00.001+03:00

‘Iam ready to become an Internet wizard’, said one of the members who attended a discussion between RICNET and Kyenjojo District Planning technical Committee (TPC) , at the council hall on 31^st October 2011.The meeting was chaired by the District Chief Administrative officer( CAO),Mr.Katehangwa Samuel. The main issue was to discuss the idea of establishing the E-society at the District with the objective of ‘access to information sharing for socio-accountability’. The Executive Director RICNET highlighted the need for the E-sociey;

To strengthen information sharing
For timely access to information
Involvement of greater majority

He gave an illustration of www.kaseseelibrary.org as channel being used by Kasese district members in sharing information.

The members raised issues concerning the project, some wanted to know whether there are costs associated with the establishment of E-society, sustainability of the project as well as the level of utilization of the centre by the local people.

The team appreciated the initiation of the establishment of an E-society and said they were ready to become ICT experts.

RIC-NET INITIATES DISCUSSION WITH KAMWENGE DISTRICT IN SETTING UP AN ELECTRONIC SOCIETY CENTRE

2011-10-28T16:01:00.004+03:00

In an effort to promote effective informing sharing between the Local Government , CSOs and ensuring timely feedback to the citizens, RIC-NET in partnership with Rwenzori consortium for civic competence( RWECO) initiated a visit to kamwenge on Thursday 27/10/2011 where a discussion on sharing information was held between the Deputy CAO, RICNET program manager and Finance officer
After keen listening of the brief from the staff of RIC-NET on the various electronic platforms, the D.CAO inquired what information are you interested in? The team explained that the type of information to be shared was in relation to the information needs of the stakeholders of kamwenge not RIC-NET
And these needs are generated during the round table stakeholders meeting before the Electronic society centre is set up.

The D.CAO welcomed the initiative and also remarked that there is where to start as some few officers have laptops and modems, he said that the service of the E-society is immediately needed and more so training of staff in using computers
He pledged on behalf of the District to support the project and agreed that RIC-NET prepares a presentation to the technical planning committee of the District so that the concept is received wholesome. This meeting is yet to be held in November.
Along with them the team had carried copies of RIC-NET and RWECO newsletter as seen in one of the photos the D.CAO looks at the kasese E-Society centre in the RWECO Newsletter.

RWECO CONDUCTS SECOND STAFF MEETING

2011-10-24T17:06:00.002+03:00

Biblically noted that “do not give up the spirit of meeting together”, RWECO as well upholds this practice to strengthen collaboration between the partner organizations, create a platform for experience sharing about the different activities being implemented by partners and to help partners keep abreast/track on the progress of the project under implementation by the different partners (KALI, IWDP, RIC-NET and GoodHope Foundation for Rural Development.)
RWECO on 21.10.11 held her second staff meeting at Kasese SSD. The purpose of the meeting was to bring partners together to review the progress of the project and to also share on key upcoming activities; how and when they will be done.
During the meeting the partners shared reports indicating that a number of activities ranging from conducting staff meetings, radio programs, conducting of inception meetings and a baseline survey in the project areas, trainings, mobilization and selection of monitors, and in - putting to the production of the recently published RWECO Newsletter were some of the activities conducted.
Reports indicated that most of the partners had accomplished 90% of what they had initially planned to do at the inception of the ended quarter. Making her presentation the IWDP RWECO focal person Kahunde Erina revealed that “at IWDP we achieved all that we had initially been planned to do then”. According to Erina, amongst other achievements registered key among them was the establishment and strengthening of rapport between IWDP and the Local Governments in the project areas especially in Kyegegwa District, and the ability of the new RWECO focal person Kabasinguzi Margaret to cope and also perform her job so well.
In addition to this, RIC-NET also noted that she had been able to enhance her visibility locally, Nationally and Internationally, had built and also tested the Bulk Sms platform, enhanced staff capacity and skills in pro- poor budget analysis, revamped the functionality of the E-Society Center in Kasese and the D-group among others, while KALI also indicated that it had strengthened rapport with the District leadership in Kamwenge which even offered KALI office space when it effectively starts implementation of the project in the District and also been able to mentor 280 people in their different areas of operation.
In a related development GoodHope Foundation noted that it had been able to form/establish project structures in the areas of operation and to also strengthen rapport with Bundibudgyo District Local Government which recently invited them to attend the District quarterly NAADs meeting as key stakeholders in development. Finally, speaking for RWECO CU- Baluku Jimmy Odyek highlighted that the Coordinating Unit had also been able to maintain, sustain and strengthen the consortium and also enhance the Consortium’s Networks with other partners like Oxfam Novib.
A quick scan through the three areas under M&E; Weak institutional linkages within CSOs and LGs, Low and ineffective engagement of citizens and the LGs and Inadequate access to and utilization of reliable information by the citizens. It was observed that under linkages with LGs, RWECO had been able to work with 81 Sub Counties and 7 Local Governments. This is evidenced in the LG’s willingness to share District information/reports, offer office space, and also pledge provision of equipments to the initiatives started by the partners like the E-Society Center in Kabarole and Kasese.
About linkages with other CSOs, members agreed that the pledges from other CSOs to offer equipment to E-society Centers and to also jointly implement the project with them is an indicator of the established linkages with other CSOs. Some of the CSOs include Unite and Link in Kamwenge, Toro Development, RAC, KIC and KANCA in Kabarole District, Partnership with computers for schools Uganda, Aljazeera, UNICIEF, VSO, SNV, and CARE International in Uganda among others.
Commenting on the area, Citizen’s engagement of LGs, members reported increased Community vigilance on reporting of service delivery challenges.
However, members also highlighted a number of challenges which were encountered during the implementation of the activities; it was generally noted that some project Sub Counties were too large, distant and therefore hard to reach and adequately work in given the inadequate resource envelope and the difficulty in accessing secretarial services, and mobile phone network.
During the meeting a number of recommendations were made, these included;
1. More fundraising should be done by the Coordinating Unit to cater for the inadequacy that might hinder effective implementation of the project in the hard to reach sub counties.
2. Routine engagement with monitors should be considered to ensure full ownership and conceptualization of the project by the monitors.
3. Quick establishment of E-society Centers in the District where they are not should be considered to answer the impatience of the District officials and to also confirm the seriousness of RWECO towards working with the respective District LGs.
4. An official launch of the project should be done to cement the already established rapport.
5. RWECO should train District leaders in the project areas on issues of Social Accountability before effective implementation of the project begins, similarly radio programs should be conducted to introduce the project to the stakeholders in the project areas.
6. Finally, members agreed that in future T-shirts and Identity Cards should be made and given to the monitors for purposes of identification and motivation.

PREVENTION OF AIDS/HIV AT WORK PLACE.

2011-10-24T16:39:00.004+03:00

More than 42 million people around the world are affected with HIV virus and 26 million are estimated to be workers in their prime productive years.In Uganda over 1 million people are affected with HIV.The pandemic has adverse effects on the socio-economic developments sectors of the country. The impact is simillary manifested through declining productivity ,increased costs, declining profit .HIV is now a mojor workplace issue.

It should be noted that dispite the overall diclining prevalence rates registered
HIV Infection rates are still un acceptably high .There a need for concerted efforts to reduce on the prevalence and sustain HIV/AIDS prevention and control.

employers should promote quality of life and productivity by developing and implementing HIV/AIDS workplace policies and programmes.
The policy development and implimentationn guidline is specifically disigned to guide employer in the development and implementation of HIV/AIDS Policies and programmes.The policy aim at preventing the infection and reducing its impact at the workplace.,

KYENJOJO DISTRICT E-SOCIETY ROUND TABLE MEETING REAPS

2011-10-24T10:35:00.005+03:00

RIC-NET in partnership with Rwenzori Consortium for civic competence (RWECO) conducted a round table meeting on the 20th October 2011 at the district headquarters in the district council chambers.

This meeting was as a result of the discussion held in September 2011 with the CAO kyenjojo and the secretary for social services whereby RIC-NET introduced the idea of promoting partnership on effective information sharing between the District Local Government, CSOs and the citizens The meeting was a follow up on how effective information sharing can be promoted in the District,
Various participants attended to give their views including the District officials, CSOs representatives, Religious leaders, the media and representatives of the business community
During the meeting the Executive Director RIC-NET gave a detailed presentation on using the model of the E-Society in bridging the gap between the District Local government, CSOs and the entire community in terms of;
• Access to information
• Voicing the silence and
• Accountability
Mr Murugahara J.Silco the Executive Director mentioned the various online resources that would aid in availing timely and relevant information to the community like the District website, District news blog, E-Library, Dgroup (Discussion platform) and the CSOs portal.

Later a session of reactions chaired by Mr.Mwirima James the co-coordinator RWECO led to a number of issues where among others included;
It was appreciated that there was a starting point since some departments had computers and internet
Outlining a number of requirements that are needed to have the E-society in place
A draft Memorandum of understanding (MOU) to be shared among stake holders to discuss and have their inputs and later signed to enable commencement of the Electronic centre
Information flow and control managed by the District Information Officer (DIO) since the center is meant to strengthen his office and in this case avoiding information distortion since members expressed concern about information security.
Key stake holders to this noble cause were also outlined and their roles.
In her closing remarks the, District secretary for production Ms Tumuranze Grace appreciated the efforts of RIC-NET/RWECO in strengthening information sharing
She pledged to further the ideas to the District executive for discussion and also assured the meeting that she was ready to enroll for the computer classes as soon as this would be established.
She called upon the CSOs to join in this cause of establishing the E-society. She also pledged the support of the district in moving forward to the establishment of the E-society in the District.
The meeting was adjourned at around 1:45 PM.

KABAROLE DISTRICT E-SOCIETY CENTER STARTS WITH A BIG BANG!

2011-10-17T10:09:00.005+03:00

In the bid to facilitate increased access to timely and credible information by the community in Kabarole District, RIC-NET in partnership with Kabarole District Local Government have embarked on establishing an E-Society Center at the District head quarters in Booma.
The E-Society Center’s vision is to ensure access to credible and timely information that can influence social accountability and also voice the silent issues/persons in Society.
To usher it in, RIC-NET and Kabarole District Local Government held a round table meeting on 13.10.11 at Toro Club to discuss and also map out modalities on how to get the E-Society Center functional come November 2011.
Speaking at the Meeting, the Kabarole District Information Officer Lillian Nkwenge expressed gratitude to RIC-NET for its interest in working with Kabarole DLG to promote increased access to information. She noted that they (RIC-NET and Kabarole Local Government) shared a vision.
Making his presentation about the E-society Center, the RIC-NET Executive Director Mr. John Silco explained that the Center is expected to facilitate universal and timely access to information, cause global influence and increased involvement of the greater majority; the grass root persons participating in the decision making process at the district.

The meeting that brought together other CSOs in Kabarole like RAC,KANCA,KIC, Toro Development Network, IWDP, and FORUD discussed a lot of things ranging from when the Center should commence, what it will do, who will provide what and how it (the Center) will be sustained.
Commenting on who would provide what, Lillian noted that Kabarole DLG is going to provide space (2 rooms), furniture (lockable office Cup Boards ), staff, carpet and information, while RIC-NET will provide Hard ware (5 computers),1 Multi- printer (Photocopier, printer and scanner),Internet support, trainings (introduction to computer, web2.o tools), staff up to December 2013, designing the District Website, development of on-line platforms – bulk Sms, e-library and d-groups, radio programs, small generator and technical back up from time to time.
In addition to this, KIC also offered to provide 7 desktop computers, 15 chairs, shelves, information sourcing from the community and Community Based Officers, and supporting the community Development office, while FORUD offered an office desk, and Toro Development Network offered radio programs effective January 2012. IWDP, RAC and KANCA pledged to communicate the kind of support they would offer by the end of October 2011.
Discussing what the Center would provide, the participants noted that first it should be established what kind of information needs are in the society, arguing that this would guide information sharing by the different stakeholders in terms of; what information should be shared, in what form, how often and through what channel? Its upon this that the members recommended that another meeting for majorly District heads of department be organized in the last week of October to critically think through these ideas as heads of department who will be regular providers of information to the Center.
Sharing their views the RWECO Coordinator Mr. James Mwirima and the KIC Chairperson Mr. Baguma Johnstone appealed to the CAO and the other stakeholders to put more efforts on influencing attitude change towards information sharing, arguing that even when most people have vital information they are always too reluctant to share it. They noted that there is need for people to learn the importance of information sharing and to routinely do it voluntarily and timely whether physically or electronically.
Closing the meeting the C.A.O Mr. Juma Nyende thanked the members for turning up for the meeting and for their different pledges towards the establishment of the E-Society Center and particularly to RIC-NET for the initiative to work with Kabarole DLG to promote easy access to information. He noted that the establishment of an E-Society Center is in line with the District’s objectives, because the District is equally supposed to have a resource center but due to limited funding it has not been able to have a functional one.
The CAO revealed that he was excited about this joint initiative that was going to make their resource room finally functional and to also add value to the services offered by Kabarole District Local Government . He pledged continued support towards this cause.

THE CURRENT HEAVY RAINS ARE DISASTROUS TO FARMERS

2011-10-05T10:46:00.008+03:00

The current rains have brought more harm than good especially to the farmers. Heavy rain down pour is one of the most pronounced effect of climate change .
As much as all crops need atleast some water to survive , a regular rain pattern is vital for healthy crops because too much rain can be harmful to crops and even devastating for farmers.
One major effect of excessive rainfall is delayed planting and reduction in crop yields which jeopardizes profit for the farmers. Floods,lightening strikes , and landslides have all been a result of heavy rains .

Most roads in rural areas which before were in a poor state are now in a sorry state due to heavy rains leading to increased transport costs for farmers which they can not afford.
Therefore transportation of their produce to the market has become increasingly expensive and this consequently affected the price on foodstuffs which have gone high as well.
Most areas have experienced flooding and because of this some farmers store houses have been washed away in the process while other farmers can not leave their homes for fear of being carried away by floods or struck by lightening.

RWENZORI REGION CELEBRATES INTERNATIONAL OLDER PERSONS DAY

2011-10-03T16:42:00.005+03:00

INTERNATIONAL DAY OF THE OLDER PERSONS CELEBRATED IN RWENZORI REGION
October 1st 2011 marked the celebrations for the older persons in Rwenzori region and specicifically in kyenjojo District. Since RIC-NET operates in this area, the staffs were among the thousands of participants who filled the District Headquarters grounds on Saturday to mark this day & also witness the launching of the Social Assistance Grant for the Elderly (SAGE) where the chief guest was the Vice president of the republic of Uganda

According to the program line up for the international day of older persons produced by the ministry of Gender, Labor and social Development
Older persons are defined as persons aged 60 years and above (Uganda national policy for older persons 2009)
Theme of the day
“Social protection a pre-requisite for empowerment of older persons’’
Ministry of gender, labor and social development is championing the development of a national social protection system that addresses the risks and vulnerabilities faced by the poorest groups of the population

With support from development partners as DFID, Irish Aid, UNICEF, the scheme provides cash grants to the chronically poor and vulnerable persons to enable them access basic needs as well as spur them to engage in other productive activities.
“In his speech the chief Guest, remarked that Government is determined to reduce income insecurity for older persons through programmes as SAGE, Functional adult literacy (FAL) among others, he also gave an example of countries as Brazil and South Africa that have adopted social protection in the National development program (senior citizens grants) these countries have shown that older persons basic needs are met, their incomes have increased and health catered for.
Kyenjojo District is among the pilot Districts for the cash transfers and the target sub counties for the moment are Bufunjo and Nyankwanzi.

SNV Conducts Eighth Multi Stakeholder Platform (MSP) Meeting.

2011-09-29T17:34:00.000+03:00

SNV in partnership with the MSP stakeholders today 29.09.11 conducted their eighth Multi stakeholder’s platform meeting (at Gardens restaurant in Fort Portal) under the theme “partnerships in enhancing the pineapple value chain in the Rwenzori region”.
The purpose of the meeting was to bring key stakeholders in the pineapple value chain together to share ideas on how partnerships can be utilized to enhance pineapple production, processing and marketing in the Rwenzori region.
Participants included staff from NARO, FAO, RIC-NET, SNV, District NAADs Officials, and pineapple growing farmers from the Rwenzori region.

During the meeting participants shared what they have been doing since the last MSP meeting in April 2010. Sharing their experiences, a representative from Kyenjojo District revealed that 16 coaches from 16 sub counties had been trained on how to manage the pineapple wilt disease that was raised by the farmers in the previous MSP meeting as a major challenge. These coaches are expected to go down and train their fellow farmers about the same. A stakeholders’ platform for pineapple farmers had also been held.
In Kamwenge District the farmers in Kahunge had chosen to first establish the number of pineapple farmers and the number of suckers they had in total; 20 farmers and 4012 suckers were established to be in place, while in Nyabbani Sub county farmers had been organized to start bulk marketing and had already established pineapple collection centers.

Reporting for Kasese Yofesi Kitholu regretted to note that they had not yet held a District stakeholders meeting but that they were planning to do so soon whereas in Ntoroko pineapple farmers had held a meeting to share on how they can be successful pineapple farmers because the biggest challenge is that farmers are still farming in isolation.
The meeting learnt that Kabarole did not have many pineapple farmers although it had 5 processors producing wine, juice and jam.
A staff from NARO indicated that a national stakeholders meeting had been held on 05.09.11 in Kampala, during which meeting the MSP objectives had been redefined and a road map on how and where the platform should proceed was drafted.
In his presentation about cross boarder experience/interventions in pineapple growing, Kiiza Daniel from FAO among others revealed that they are piloting marketing of solar dried pineapples because they have value addition; a longer shelf life, approximately 2 years without getting spoilt, less transportation costs, and they fetch a relatively higher price on the market (a kilogram ranges from 7000 to 10000 shillings). This is already being done in Kasese, Kampala, Kayunga and Tororo Districts.
In addition to this an Official from the Kasese NAADs office shared that the NAADs office in partnership with the national NAADs Secretariat are planning to set up a regional information center for marketing in Kasese. The Center that is going to be fully stocked with Computers installed to the internet is going to be hosted by Abasaija Kweyamba Cooperative Society and is expected to serve all the farmers in the Rwenzori region. Similarly Mubuku irrigation scheme is also going to be supplied with similar facilities and charged with a responsibility of disseminating market prices to the farmers in the region.

Besides experience sharing the participants were also refreshed on how to manage on control the spread of pineapple pests and diseases like Wilting, mealybugs and nematodes among others. Participants learnt that wilting is mainly caused by poor drainage. The facilitator also noted that weeds and shade are detrimental to pineapples. He advised the farmers to always treat suckers with chloropyritos or locally made pesticides mixed form ash, urine and tobacco before planting them as a remedy for mealybugs, nematodes and wilting.
Other issues discussed included the use of coaches (trained farmers in the community expected to train and motivate others) as an ideal model to help farmers access knowledge and skills that can improve their farming.

The meeting helped in pointing out the different activities that partners were doing in the areas of production; Increase sucker multiplier sites, and quality production, marketing; quality plus quality assurance, record keeping-production, group marketing- collection centers, and value addition; piloting pineapple drying, improving on quality and hygiene.

CLIMATE CHANGE HAS INCREASED DEMAND FOR FOOD WORLD WIDE

2011-09-29T15:53:00.005+03:00

The causes and effects of the global economic crisis are well documented and have been the subject of debate in virtually every conference on this planet .At same time there is immense pressure on the global supply of food and natural resources due to change of climate , and cross board trade has increased the demand of food supply especially along CONGO boarder .Moreover the world has become an almost entirely occupied space ,as result of advent of internet and other technological developments

Countries and companies are busy looking for countries that may serve as" food baskets " when their own supplies dry up and this has triggered increase cross boarder investment. Further more companies have responded to technological developments by restructuring their operations and reducing operation costs to remain competitive. BY Rwaheeru Geoffrey

PLANT DOCTORS BRING HOPE TO FARMERS IN BUNDIBUGYO

2011-09-22T13:07:00.003+03:00

Health is solely part and parcel of human beings and other living things. This is what RIC-NET under the program health plants for a health future is looking at. Plant Doctors have been trained under the Global Plant Clinic program. Unlike before, when it took ages for agricultural extension worker to reach to the farmers. But with the emergency of plant clinic in Bundibugyo, It now takes a minute for the farmer to get advisory service from the plant doctor based in the communities.

Affected plants have reduced major crop production especially maize, banana, cassava, cocoa and beans. In most part of Bundibugyo district the Banana Bacterial Wilt, maize weevil, cassava mosaic, insects and mites that enter the pod have continuously frustrated the farmers to reap from their labour. Cocoa production in Bundibugyo is also likely to reduce because of the diseases that affect the pods and the entire plant in the field.

Plant doctors are serving voluntarily in the different places of the community especially Bubandi and Bundibugyo Town Council; he(s) is farmer trained on different crop, pest and disease control practices. They visit farmers in the garden and in most cases farmers come with crop samples for diagnosis. In both places the open plant clinic is on Monday.

According to Musoke Wilson a plant Doctor at Semliki plant clinic, he said there is “a big positive change in the community”. Farmers are becoming interested in bringing samples of sick crops to the doctors. This is due to the fact that, the service provided is free and plant Doctors are community based and easily accessed. In addition, high ability of farmers’ to mobilize themselves to utilize plant clinics or source the information has increased information sharing. The willingness of the plant Doctor to handle farmers’ problems at that particular moment has brought hope to the farmers to get rid of the pests and diseases to the crops.

MARKET INFORMATION SYMPOSIUM

2011-09-19T10:01:00.002+03:00

The second market Information symposium took place from 15-16^th September 2011 at Silver Springs Hotel in Kampala. The main theme was “Marketing Information a Leverage in National Food security Planning and Regional Sustainable Trade”. The symposium was organized by FIT-Uganda in partnership with AGRI- PROFOCUS (APF).

RICNET was represented by the Executive Director and the ICT Officer. The symposium provided a platform for discussion and dialogue among service providers, users, policy makers, traders and farmers within Uganda and East Africa.

Particular emphasis was placed on drawing lessons on best practices for sustainable information systems that can be replicated within the region to increase service efficiency and effectiveness to the end users.

FAREWELL FOR INFORMATION ADVISOR

2011-09-19T09:17:00.000+03:00

"YOU DID IT", these were the words of the Executive Director RICNET to the outgoing Information advisor Mr ,Rajamohan .The function took place inside RICNET's board room.It was a great moment as all staff were present to say bye to Raja who had been in the organization for one year. It was a good moment for Raja as he was going back to his home country though he was going to miss the beauty of the pearl of Africa, RICNET as an organisation was going to miss the company and the expertise from Mr.Raja especially the time he introduced the management tools.The staff later had lunch with the adviser,it was such a greatful day.

RICNET INITIATES PARTNERSHIP WITH BUNDIBUGYO DISTRICT LOCAL GOVERNMENT IN INFORMATION SHARING

2011-09-16T13:13:00.006+03:00

By Joselyne Kyomuhendo
It was a journey of a team on thursday 15th September 2011 as the staff of Rwenzori information centers network (RIC-NET) travelled through Ntoroko in the low lands of Butuku where the new road passes and finally the reached town by 11:30am
Kyomuhendo Joselyne, kaliba Charles from RIC-NET along with Mwasi Charles from semuliki information centre were at the District headquarters where they met the Chief Administrative officer and introduced the interests of RIC-NET in partnering with the District to enhance information sharing for more citizen participation in the development processes, RIC-NET will build the District website, Establish an E-society centre , train the District team in the use of the above packages after the round table meeting with the other stakeholders

construction on Bundibugyo Road
The CAO welcomed the initiative of RIC-NET and communicated that services as internet are much needed in the District as they are not available currently, to this effect a room was secured to host the centre, by yesterday an officer was assigned to correspond with RICNET for further progress
A memorandum of understanding will be signed before the centre formally takes off.

CAO & District staff in the proposed room to host the E-centre

LAMIS AND FARMIS INTRODUCED TO RIC-NET AND HER RURAL INFORMATION CENTERS (RICs) STAFF

2011-09-10T08:59:00.003+03:00

FIT-UGANDA conducted training with RIC-NET and her RICs staff on 5th 09.2011 to 7th 09.2011 at Kabarole Information Center (KIC).
The training was intended to introduce the two products that FIT-Uganda has on market that facilitate the management of market prices and farmers records online.
The two products are;
LAMIS (Localised Agricultural marketing information systems) and
FARMIS (farmer record Management Information System)
The main aim of introducing these online platforms was to reduce time in data collection and analysis
Other yet important factors of introducing these management information systems (MIS) were;
• Aiding farmers in Comparison of prices
• Enabling farmers/traders make decisions on whether to store or not to store produce
• Help farmers reduce risks associated with marketing.
• To provide historical data (price trends)
• Help farmers get information on what products to farm in.
• Help in planning and evaluation i.e food security

 Another product introduced was the bulky SMS (web2phone) that would provide information about agricultural prices to farmers on their phones as long as a farmer subscribes to get the information.

Nearly 80% of the training was practical (hands on). On the second day of the training, participants moved to Mpanga market to collect market prices from traders and entered them in the system.
Equally a number of other tools were introduced that will enable data collectors (RICs) to gather information from farmers and markets.
Among others were the crop card and the profiling book.
Participants enjoyed the training that was facilitated by Madam Rita and Paul from FIT-Uganda.

The training ended successfully on the third day at 5:00 pm and the way forward was the Rural information Centers (RICs) to immediately start collecting data from their farmers by use of the crop card for those who had profiled first and then use of the profiling book for those RICs that were going to do it for the first time.
FIT-Uganda also trained a staff from RIC-NET in the administration of the online platforms and promised to send the administration account details as soon the system is fully in use.

HEALTHY PLANTS FOR HEALTHY PEOPLE

2011-09-02T14:29:00.006+03:00

Human beings have Clinics while cars and motorbikes have garages/clinics, so why not plants? remarked Dr. Andrew Mugalula the Plant Clinic Country Director- Ministry of Agriculture while facilitating a two days training on plant clinics at RIC-NET offices.
The aim of plant clinics is to help farmers recognize their problems and solve them.
The training whose objective was to enhance participants knowledge and skills in plant diagnosis and electronic data entry run from 31.08.11 to 01.09.11.
The training also aimed at creating a fora for experience sharing on the community’s perception on plant clinics, most common crop diseases reported, lessons learnt, and challenges encountered in the implementation of the project by the plant doctors.

Participants were drawn from Bundibudgyo and Kasese Districts where RIC-NET is piloting the plant clinics project and from the information Centers where she intends to extend the project soon. They included 7 active plant doctors and the 7 information officers from RIC-NET’s Information Centers. Other participants were 4 RIC-NET staff.

Sharing their experiences, the plant doctors noted that the community is so grateful about the plant clinic project and appeals for the establishment of more plant clinics and recruitment of more plant doctors in the community. In Kyondo and Bubandi for instance, only one plant doctor is operating there. From the advisory services given the plant doctors noted that some farmers have reported improved yields in their production and a reduction in the infection rate of their gardens especially the banana plantations.

Overwhelming numbers of clients bringing their sick crop samples; for instance in Bubandi Sub county in Bundibudgyo members learnt that the plant Doctor Katushabe Agnes had received 250 clients since February 2011 to date,inadequate facilitation to visit the farmers’ gardens, inadequate clinical equipments like hand lenses,and disposal bins, inadequate furniture and lack of tents for shelter were named among those challenges hindering the smooth running of the plant clinics.

In addition to this the participants noted lack of knowledge about the plant clinic project amongst the leaders both at district and local Government levels,asserting that some leaders are questioning their operations/mandate. They appealed to RIC-NET to ensure more involvement and information sharing with the different leaders about this project.

Facilitating the training Andrew defined plant disgnosis as that process which involves elimination of suspcision of likely causes to real cause of the crop diesase. Plant Diagnosis is based on 3 options; A-abiotic; this is when the crop disease is caused by non living factors,B-biotic;this is when the crop disease is caused by living things,pests or mammals and C- this simply put is unknown or when the individual is confused and can’t tell the exact cause of the crop disease.
He cautioned the participants to never diagonise a plant if they ain’t sure of the problem, asserting that incase of any challenges they shouldnt hesitate to send samples to the labarotory in Kampala-Entebbe for further and proffessional diagnosis.

The participants learnt that the biggest task in running plant clinics is being able to use the symptoms- the visible expressions of a disease. Andrew revealed some of the most common symptoms to include; brown stain decay especially in cassava,distorted leaves/foliage,necrosis (loosing colour),wilting,yellowing,crocodile skin,brown streaking,leaf curling,fruit decay,white or black powder,declining,strange growths,swelling and cankers to mention but a few.
Once one is able to identify and understand the symptom then its easier to diagnise the sick crop and be able to tell if the infection is fungal,viral or bacterium. Andrew tasked the plant doctors to concentrate on understanding the symptoms first.
Commenting on the coverage of plant clinics in Uganda, the facilitator revealed that plant clinics are still very few in Uganda and majority operate as mobile clinics like only on market days as opposed to other countries like in Congo where permanent plant clinics have been established.

During the training participants were also taken through a number of templates to help them capture/record their data; electronic excel data register for their clients,client prescription form,monitoring form template, among others. Andrew explained that good record keeping makes it easier for the plant doctor to keep track of the number of clients,crop diseases reported and progress registered in a specific period. Other issues trained in were, how to become a plant doctor and how a plant clinic operates.

The participants were introduced to various video showcase studies on plant clinic operations in the world from which they learnt the positive impact that plant clinics have had to the lives of the farmers,the practicability/operations of a plant clinic,and the different media (radios,banners,and public address systems) plant doctors have used to create awareness about plant clinic operations.

As part of the training the participants had a field visit to SATNET’s demonstration site and training center at Toro Botanical Gardens where they were able to look at diffrenet plants and also study the different symptoms exhibited on the crops. Crop samples were picked and jointly looked at in groups by the participants under the guidance of the facilitator.

From the training RIC-NET learnt that participants’ knowledge and skills on plant diagnosis and data entry was enhanced and a broader understanding on how plant clinics operate created.

Wrapping up the training, participants recommended thus; RIC-NET should conduct a follow up exercise to the plant clinics and conduct an evaluation of their operations and also share with the people on ground about this project, more engagement of and information sharing about the plant clinic project should be done with the different stakeholders especially the district and sub county Agricultural officers.

There is also need to establish more plant clinics, and, to train and recruit more plant doctors to meet the high farmers’ demands on ground; related to this RIC-NET should work towards strengthening the existing plant clinics in terms of providing clinical equipments,furniture and imparting more knowledge and skills in various areas to the plant doctors.
The participants also appealed for regular capacity building trainings and to have the training content on DVDs so that they can share/show case it to the communities for easier learning and understanding of symptom identification in crops.

RICNET AND IWDP WORKING ON EDUCATION AND NAADS IN KYEGEGWA DISTRICT

2011-08-29T09:41:00.007+03:00

Rwenzori information centers Network (RICNET) and Integrated Women Development Program (IWDP) under the Rwenzori consortium for civic competence
Were in Kyegegwa District for a Baseline survey in the areas of Education (UPE) and NAADs
The team set off for this exercise on 16th-20th August where they first interacted with the district Officials
During the discussion with the Chief Administrative officer Kyegegwa, The Executive Director of RICNET
Introduced the concept of working with the District to establish an E-Soceity centre which would be a one stop centre for the District team and CSOs to access and share information with the citizens in the areas of service delivery
The concept was highly appreciated by the District and are eagerly waiting for the initiation of the centre
The survey team was able to reach two sub counties of Mpara and Kakabara:
Education

Schools of Mpara
• Mpara primary school
• Nyakasaka Primary school
• Kisambya primary school
Schools of kakabara
• Kakabara primary school
• Kyaisaza primary school
• Kyarweehuta Primary school
NAADS
During the interviews on NAADs, a number of participants were available ranging from beneficiary farmers, members of the procurement committee, LCIII chair persons and NAADs coordinators.

RIC-NET Trains Information Officers and Coordinators

2011-08-26T18:25:00.001+03:00

Following the establishment of eight county Information Centers and various information points in the Rwenzori Region and the recruitment of Information Officers and Coordinators to manage information services offered in the different Centers, coupled with the new developments and changes in the world of information and communication today, RIC-NET finds it pertinent that individuals’ capacities are built and made compliant to the transitions there in.

In light of the above RIC-NET organized a two days training of Information Officers and Coordinators of the eight county Information Centers on 25.08.11 to 26.08.11 at Kabarole Information Center board room. Twenty three people (6 females and 17males) participated in this training.

The purpose of the workshop was to enhance participants’ knowledge and skills in information, information sourcing, documenting and dissemination and to also share the HIVOs and RWECO work plans with the members.

The participants were taken through what information and documentation is, what type of information can be sourced and documented and how, from whom it should be collected and when, among others.

Facilitating the session, James Mwirima noted that when collecting, documenting and disseminating information, emphasis should be put on who we are targeting, where they are located and the economic, social-political issues around them.
Explaining why we share information, James highlighted causing positive change, awareness creation, skills development, influencing policies, adoption of new methods, attitudes and improving governance as some of the reasons why information sharing is done.

James also encouraged the participants to learn how to document their success stories very well and also use every strategic fora available to share them, asserting that this would win publicity and consequent funding for the Information Centers. However in disseminating information we should always be mindful of two things; use of the right fora and the quality of information to be disseminated/shared.

During the training, the Information Officers also shared experiences of their work with each other; these included achievements, target communities, activities being conducted and services offered by the Information Centers as well as the challenges encountered in their day to day work.

Cross cutting challenges faced by the centers included inadequate funding to facilitate smooth running of activities, inadequate equipments (computers, and cameras among others),high financial expectations from the community during engagements with them, unreliable internet connection, high rental charges and lack of permanent/personal office premises, and lack of staff among others.

Other issues shared were the HIVOS, and RWECO work plans; RIC-NET Executive Director informed the participants that the Information Centers were going to receive some funding under RWECO to work on a number of program areas like; citizenship expression and engagement, social inclusion of the vulnerable and minority groups in the community, use of electronic media-UDUMA and voicing the silence.

He cautioned the participants that in the social accountability- citizenship expression and engagement program evidence based monitoring reports will be required and paramount to engage duty bearers geared at causing positive change in the community.
He appealed to the participants to verify every information they land their hands on before sharing it.

In his presentation, the Executive Director tasked the participants to be accountable and transparent before they can begin holding others accountable. He also encouraged participants to attend and participate in meetings in their communities, explaining that this will help us to keep abreast with what is going on and also provide foras for disseminating information.

About the use of online platforms, the Director informed the members that bulk Sms is going to be adopted for disseminating information to the community. A short code 6333 had already been procured to facilitate the same and that Information Centers will be expected to collect contacts of different stakeholders that they engage with in their activities.
Wrapping up the sessions, it was agreed that all information centres should develop concepts on which centers they are going to be working with in the RWECO program, the target groups and what kind of information they intend to be sharing with them and to ensure that these concepts are submitted to RIC-NET by 02.09.11 such that their funds can be advanced to them to begin implementation.

In addition to this, participants agreed that two success stories from every Information Center should be documented and sent to RIC-NET by 10.09.11 for inclusion in the upcoming RIC-NET Newsletter.

Conclusively it can be noted that participant’s skills and knowledge on information sourcing and documentation was enhanced. Participants understanding of the RWECO project and what is expected of them was also created.

The trainings were facilitated by Mr. James Mwirima, Mr. John Silco and the RICNET Information officer Alice Mbayahi and Program Manager Ms. Kyomuhendo Joselyne.

OUT BREAK OF CROP DISEASES FRUSTRATES NAADS PR0JECT

2011-08-19T22:57:00.003+03:00

In the on-going baseline survey conducted by RWECO – (Good Hope Foundation and RIC-NET) in the Rwenzori region; Bubukwanga SubCounty in Bundibugyo District to be specific, monitoring indicates that a number of challenges are frustrating the NAADs project; according to the Chairperson Sub County Farmers Forum Mr. Tibamwenda Smith, limited ownership of the enterprises/project by the farmers, inadequate knowledge on crop growing /animal rearing especially of the improved NAADs reeds,conservativeness of the benefeciaires to grow only traditional crops even though they do not yield much, delayed release of funds/enterprises and out break of crop diseases are some of the challenges frustrating the project.

Mr. Tibamwenda revealed that at times funds/enterprises are released after the planting or rainy season leaving the farmers frustrated especially if had already prepared their gardens.

Commenting on the out break of diseases, Tibamwenda cited banana wilt as the biggest challenge affecting the farmers’ plantantions. He noted that, the Sub County in the finacial year 2000/2009 started a banana plantation as a demonstration site at the sub county premises. The species of banana grown were kitika, gonja,and mpologoma among others.
In 2009, the sub county started harvesting bananas from the garden and would sell them at prices ranging from 5000 to 8000shillings a bunch. The money collected was usaully deposited on the Sub County NAADs account and later used to settle other finacial demands in the sector.
Unfortunately, these good yields have since 2010 been frustrated by banana wilt disease that has since seen all the plants rotting away. Despite the farmers’ efforts to cut down the affected plants, the disease has contiued spreading further and eaten up the whole one hectare banana plantation.
According to Mr. Tibamwenda over 150000 shillings had so far been realized from the sales.

Its worth noting that following the various changes in the implementation of the NAADs project; NAADs phaseI and NAADs phaseII, a number of achievements have been registered ranging from transperancy in the procurement process, and in the selection of benefeciaries as well as enterprises to increased coverage in the number of benefeciaries.

However, there is need for the NAADs project to beef up her interventions in addressing crop diseases least the whole project is frustrated by the same.

Field Experience

2011-08-18T09:28:00.001+03:00

RICNET Staff preparing to go to the field

On Tuesday 16^th August 2011 RICNET joined her partners in the Rwenzori region in conducting a base line survey to establish the quality and type of service delivery in education and agriculture.

The team that went to Kyegegwa set off at 10:00 am led by the Executive Director, Mr. John Silco, Programme manager, Ms Joselyn, ICT officer Betty and an Intern student Joy. The team first went to the district headquarters of Kyenjojo to meet partners from IWDP before proceeding to Kyegegwa

Cadet officers on training in Kyenjojo

At Kyenjojo district
headquarters there were a number of activities going on one being recruitment of cadet officers, it was such an interesting experience as the youths were sweating under going the training.

RWECO Partners Conduct Baseline Survey

2011-08-16T12:45:00.002+03:00

Following the training of RWECO partners (Good Hope, KALI, IWDP and RIC-NET) in pro-poor budget analysis on 11.08.11 to 13.08.11, partners have today started on a baseline survey exercise in their respective districts of operation; KALI in Kamwenge, Good Hope in Bundibugyo, and IWDP in Kyegegwa. RICNET staff is expected to beef up the different teams in areas of documentation.

The purpose of the baseline survey is to establish the quality and type of service delivery in the education and agriculture (NAADs) sectors in the sub counties to be surveyed. Two sub counties per district are going to be sampled for this exercise.

In Kamwenge, Kicheche and Kamwenge Town Council will be surveyed, while in Bundibugyo, Bubukwanga and Nyahuka town council and in Kyegegwa District Mpara and Kakabara sub counties will be visited during this exercise.
This survey is also geared at establishing the extent of inclusion of the concerns of the poor into the sub counties’ budgets and plans. With particular focus on the financial year 2011-2012.

In each of the Sub Counties, partners are expected to visit 3 UPE schools and around 15 NAADs farmers (beneficiaries). Other participants in the survey will include; District and Sub County leaders; CAOs, NAADs Coordinators and other staff, Sub County Chiefs, DEOs, Head teachers, teachers and pupils at the sampled schools, and some members of the community among others.

Areas to be looked at during the survey range from the Number and quality of facilities and services in these sectors, the teacher pupil ratio, status of available infrastructure,sanintation issues, funding, that is in terms of its timeliness, frequency, and amount, professionalism of staff, enrollment and retention of pupils in school, functionality of school and NAADs committees/structures to the procurement process and procedures under NAADs programs and the selection of NAADs beneficiaries in light of sex, issues of co-founding and Number of households benefiting from this service among others.

The survey that starts today will run up to 20.08.11.

The data collected will be analyzed by the different partners and compiled into reports that will be presented by end of August during a joint meeting of all RWECO partners that will convene to come up with a main report about the whole exercise.
This main report will be used for further advocacy at both District and National levels.

RICNET staff Conduct Familiarization visits to her Information Centers in Kasese District

2011-08-12T16:01:00.003+03:00

RICNET Staff on 10.08.11 conducted a familiarization visit to her Information Centers in Kasese District.
The purpose of the visit was to introduce the new RICNET staff ( Kyomuhendo Joselyn Program Manger and Alice Mbayahi Information Officer) to the Information Centers in the district. Four staff participated in this exercise; kyomuhendo Joselyne, Mbayahi Alice, Rwaheeru Geoffry and Baluku Yosia. The team visited Bwera information center (BIC) and Busongora information center (BRIC) at county level, and Bughoye, Kabatunda, Rwesande information centers at the sub county level.

At BIC, the visiting team met with the finance and administration officer Mr. Mapoze, Mr. Baluku Xaverio a field officer and Ms. Kyakimwa Agnes. BIC staff expressed gratitude to RICNET’s initiative to come down to the information centers explaining that it was going to bridge the gap between RICNET and her information centers. The visiting team also learnt that BIC operates in 11 sub counties and has 16 functional information centers. BIC’s main activity is providing information to communities, especially the farmers.
Sharing about the ongoing good governance/social accountability program, Mr. Mapoze noted that BIC had so far monitored a number of projects in the 10 sub counties where she operates except Mahango where she hadn’t gone yet due to inadequate resources. Projects in the sectors of health and education were monitored and a number of issues were generated; inadequate and delayed release of UPE funds to schools, declining education standards, lack of support from relevant stakeholders like parents and leaders in terms of supervision and enforcing by-laws to keep children in school. In health, BIC learnt that many Health Centers were faced with understaffing, frequent drug stock outs, withholding information by some health workers at HCs, inadequate supply of drugs and lack of staff quarters among others, while unreliable weather and outbreak of diseases were learnt as major challenges frustrating the farmers.
According to BIC staff, the community desires to have a platform on which to air their concerns, yet on the other hand a majority of the staff in public institutions interacted with were hesitant to share their challenges for fear of being branded anti-government.

BIC appealed to RICNET to consider facilitating public dialogues between the community and the service providers/leaders to address these service delivery challenges raised. Responding to this, the RICNET program manager appreciated BIC’s continued commitment to serving the community with information and to monitoring service delivery in the area. She revealed that RICNET was planning to organize public dialogues to address the same.

In a related development, while sharing with the chairperson of BRIC information center Mr. Isingoma Patrick , Isingoma informed the members that BRIC is a child of the former ODISEF information center. BRIC has got only 7 Information Centers at the sub county out of which only 4 are active. Lack of commitment and interest from the host organizations attributed to high expectations from RICNET that have in the long run not been met explains the non functionality of the other 3 centers. BRIC’s main objective and function is sourcing and dissemination of information to the community.

According to Mr. Patrick, BRIC’s information centers operate within the already existing structures within the communities like CBOs and FBOs. Patrick also noted that BRIC under the social accountability program monitored the NAADs program and established a number of service delivery challenges; delayed supply of in-puts to farmers for instance some farmers in Base camp who were supplied with 1 day old chicks were supplied with feeds one month after the date of delivering the chicks. Lack of routine monitoring or visits to farmers was also noted as a major challenge frustrating the NAADs project.

RICNET staff also learnt that BRIC is yet to host a workshop on community library management by end of August.

Following this sharing at BRIC offices Patrick took the RICNET staff around some of her information points; Bughoye, Kabatunda, Rwesande information centers.

The RICNET visiting team was able to understand the different services offered by the Centers and the various stakeholders that they engage with from time to time.

RIC-NET SECRETARIAT MEETS HIVOS EXPRESSION AND ENGAGEMENT PROGRAM OFFICER

2011-08-05T11:45:00.011+03:00

RIC-NET secretariat this morning at 10:00 am held a meeting with the HIVOS Expression and Engagement officer Gregory Mwendwa at RIC-NET board room.
The purpose of the meeting was to share RIC-NET's experiece in the areas of information sharing with Gregory and to also learn from him more about HIVO's interventions and ways of operation following the establishment of the regional office in Nairobi.

During the discussion RIC-NET's Executive Director shared RIC-NET's achievements, interventions, challenges and future plans. he mentioned that RIC-NET had registered an achievement in the establishment of e-platforms like E-library in Kasese at the E-society center and the Rwenzori people's voice (www.rwecovoice.blogspot.com) . he added that more of these platforms are yet to be established in the other 6 districts of the Rwenzori region.

The HIVOS program officer, Gregory, informed RIC-NET staff that he was on a familiarization tour with HIVO's partners in Uganda. He revealed that a number of restructuring had recently been done in HIVOs such as establishing a HIVOs regional office in Nairobi whose purpose is to decentralize their services and also enable them to get a better grip/feel of what is being done in the region.
The office is intended to serve their (HIVOS) partners in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania.

Ric-Net reflects on its future

2011-08-03T13:00:00.001+03:00

RIC-NET monitoring visit of the Plant Clinics in the Rwenzori Region

2011-07-27T23:23:00.003+03:00

RIC-NET staff (Progams manager mis Joselyn,Plant doctor Asaba wilberforce and Programs officer in charge of citizenship expression and engagement Mr.Timothy Balikenga) today the 27th of July 2011 started their three days monitoring visit to the plant clinics that were established in September 2010 with support from Global plant clinic together with RIC-NET. The purpose of the monitoring visit is to establish how far the plant clinic are helping rural farmers in controlling pests and diseases in order to realise high production at household level

The team started their visit in Kasese District-kisinga and kyondo sub county. During the visit,the teams went to one of the tomato garden where they identified a pest that is likely to reduce the production of tomatoes in that particular village. However,during their interaction with the farmer,it was observed the farmer had planted tomatoes in the same garden for last two planting season, secondly,the farmer had not yet applied pesticides to control the pests. This could be one of the possible causes for the infection as seen from the pictures .......more info coming

by Timothy

RIC-NET PARTICIPATES IN TSA-EXPO

2011-05-31T19:15:00.000+03:00

CEW-IT & RIC-NET PARTICIPATES IN TSA-EXPO

The Technology for Social Accountability Expo (TSA-expo) is a networking opportunity to bring PEOPLE together with TECHNOLOGY. Citizens and institutions focused on building a more cohesive, transparent and accountable Uganda can interact with technology service providers who have tools and skills to make those efforts more efficient and effective.

Technology tools that improve performance, accelerate communication, and enhance transparency between individuals, civic and political groups, businesses, and governments are increasingly available in Uganda. As we write, ICT is being used to improve services, build knowledge, organize people to debate policy and provide innovative solutions for the country’s most pressing challenges.

Uganda’s rapidly developing technological infrastructure, expertise, and mobile phone user base offers the opportunity for the nation to shine with the development and scaling up of technology applications that improve social accountability and cohesion.

RIC-NET/ CEW-IT was represented by M John Silco Chair person CEW-IT /Director RIC-NET, Mukasine Betty the IT officer at CEW-IT National Data Centre, and Erastus the Documentation officer RIC-NET.

John Silco a member on the panel discussing "Citizen Participation through Mobile Technology",presented the efforts of CEW-IT based on Uchaguzi platform.

centering on Citizens participation through Information Sharing using ICT, the ICT is used in two ways:

1.Strengthening Transparency and Accountability through access to Information.

ü On line district e-library www.kaseseelibrary.org

ü Information centres & e-society resource centre.

ü Interactive radio programme

Citizens access easily repackaged policies and government guidelines, government contracts, reports and budget estimates.

2. Facilitating feedback from the citizens and the local government .

This is done through:

ü Stake holders meeting on M&E reports.

ü Interactive community radio

ü Quarterly magazine

ü Online blog and website

after carrying out Independent budget analysis, public expenditure tracking and service delivery tracking.

He clarified that ;Uchaguzi Uganda, www.uchaguzi.co.ug is a collaborative platform by Citizens Election Watch - IT (CEW-IT), that allows citizens actively participate in observation of the election process.
Facilitates the citizens and observers to report incidents in real time, synthesizing, aggregating and displaying reports on the map.Observers report detailed account of issues on blog http://uchaguzi-uganda.blogspot.com/2011_02_01_archive.html

The information access possibilities available are: The District website, an e-library www.kaseseelibrary.org a district blog, a civil society portal and CSO blog http://rwecovoice.blogspot.com allows citizens access and share information within the community. http://uchaguzi-uganda.blogspot.com/2011_02_01_archive.html www.rwenzoripeoplesvoice.org .
Offline channels: feedback stakeholders meetings, Radio talk shows, quarterly magazine "the peoples voice” copies are on: http://www.ricnet.info/files/pub

The CEW-IT team demonstrated on how the tools are used and provided copies of the videos and quarterly magazines at the exhibition table.

E-Society Resource Centre Commissioned in Kasese

2011-04-27T13:39:00.002+03:00

From:

New Vision Monday, 25th April, 2011http://www.newvision.co.ug/D/8/18/753092

Kitaghenda (centre) listening to a presentation during the launch of the e-society

By Bernard Masereka

THE outgoing Kasese district LC5 chairman, Rev. Can. Julius Kithaghenda, has insisted that Kasese district must be split into more districts in order to create harmony and development in the area.

He was speaking at the commissioning of the district e-society resource centre at the district headquarters on Wednesday.

Kithaghenda noted that there were many issues that had created disharmony among the people, arguing that splitting the district would be a solution.

“For harmony and individual development of our people, the district must be split,” he said.

In October last year, the district council approved the proposal to split the district into three districts of Rwenzori, Bwera and Kasese.

However, some people, including Omusinga Charles Mumbere of the Rwenzururu kingdom, resisted the proposal, arguing that the timing for the split was bad due to the election campaigns that were going on at the time.

Kithaghenda said people should not be intimidated by those who say Kasese was created out of bloodshed and cannot be split.

Local government minister Adolf Mwesige in December last year wrote to the district chairman, asking him to seek the opinion of the Rwenzururu cultural institution before the proposal could be presented to the Cabinet.

Meanwhile, Mumbere is reportedly going on with consultations on the proposal. On Wednesday, he held a closed meeting with religious leaders in the district to consult them about the proposal.

Kasese is embroiled in ethnic conflicts pitting the people in the west of the district against those from the east.

The political leadership and civil service jobs in the district have always been contentious and minority tribes have complained of marginalisation.

In the proposal for more districts, a constituency for the minority tribes had also been created.

E-society Centre Support Knowledge Building Programme

2011-04-27T13:06:00.012+03:00

Ms Fieke Jansen Programme officer ICT -Media in HIVOS arrived at RIC-NET on the 19th April aboard the RIC-NET so called "chopper". she met the staff of RIC-NET and visited some county information centres. At Kabarole information centre in fort portal municipality she was impressed by the centre set up.

The District Information Officer Kasese John.B.Thawite told the guests at the ceremony that the e-society is aimed at bringing the society of Kasese into a purview of electronic usage for poverty-reduction to improve their social economic, health, cultural and education status of the Kasese community.

‘The e-society will answer the issue of inadequate access to timely and relevant information, a key aspect that limits citizens’ effective participation in the planning and monitoring processes in the district’ Thawite added.

He said that the plan was in place to decentralize the resource centre services to counties, sub-counties and parishes in order to benefit more of the rural people.

Officiating at the ceremony the district chairman Rev. Canon Julius Kithaghenda underscored the need to empower the people with information that can help them to fight poverty.

He noted that without information sharing and giving to the people the fight against poverty would not succeed.

‘I tell you our people are derail and sometimes they vote for people they couldn’t vote for because they lack information’ Kithaghenda said.

He challenged Civil servants to be computer literate so that they can much with the technological developments in the world, proposing that computer-illiterate civil servants be sacked.

The Chief Administrative Officer Kasese Giles Kahika said that his office was drawing a plan of sustaining the e-society resource centre after the donors pulled out and assured the people that it would be maintained and serve the intended purpose.The function was attended among others by Ms Fieke Jansen a Programme officer ICT -Media in

The function comes on the heals of a seminar on knowledge sharing at development that was held at Kagote, Fort portal municipality a week before. In this seminar, farmers and expert shared information on exploring ways of making marketing mechanisms work for the poor. The e-society component opened in kasese and now being rolled in Kabarole District is key on making the information accessible to all stakeholders even market information to the poor people.

Chairperson LCV Kasese commissions the E-society resource centre

2011-04-21T10:48:00.003+03:00

“This is historical moment for Kasese District Local Government” these were the words of almost every speaker at the commissioning of the e-society resource centre at Rukoki District headquarter in Kasese District yesterday the 20^th April 20011.

The e-society is an online platform that has been created by Rwenzori Information centre network (RIC-NET) together with KALI, IWDP and GOOD Hope with support from IICD, HIVOs and Kasese district local government. It is hoped that the e-Society will answer the issue of inadequate access to timely and relevant information, a key aspect that limits citizen's effective participation in the planning and monitoring processes in the district.

While presenting his speech the outgoing chairperson LCV Kasese Rev.Canon Julius Kithaghenda said” if someone offers you a gift, you the receiver must do three things: one receive the gift, appreciate the gift and then use the gift to your benefit” he therefore called upon the people of Kasese district to use the e-society for their benefit since they had already received the facility, and they have appreciated.

Speaking at the same function, the representative from HIVOs Fieke Jansen thanked Kasese district local government for have accepted RIC-NET and RWECO their development partners operating in the area to initiate the e-society centre at the district, she also said as Hivos, they are also learning more from Kasese as per the operation of the e-society. More stories coming soon

RIC-NET IT Team Join RWECO Observers to disseminate their election monitoring report

2011-04-17T22:42:00.003+03:00

Let us build our Uganda!
These were the words of the RDC Kabarole District during the dissemination of the election monitoring report presented by Rweco observers.The RDC said every society has its weakness but the best thing to ensure that all Ugandans commit themselves towards building this country. He further said there is great improvement in the way elections are being conducted in this country compared to those of the early 80's.

ric-net 2011

2011-04-04T11:14:00.001+03:00

2010 RIC-NET with partners

2011-04-04T10:55:00.003+03:00

Ric-net 2010 in pictures

2011-04-04T10:37:00.002+03:00

WHY FIRMS MUST BUILD STRONG RELATIONS

2011-02-28T17:36:00.006+03:00

Good working relations enhance employee morale and productivity.

Have you ever reached your work place and greeted a colleague, he/ she pretended not to have heard you? Or are you this type of person that aims at doing his/her well and that is all that matters.

There are reasons why organizations or firms need to appreciate that issues like productivity, performance, profit can not be put out from how employees/employer relate with each other at workplace.

How can firms encourage positive workplace relations and benefit from improved performance, coordination and productivity. Here are some of the ways an employer or company can attain this.

Respect;

What you do to show your colleague that you respect them. Anyway, before you respect others, do you respect yourself? This is what we may call self-esteem. We’ve all heard of employers who real don’t respect them selves.

Talking about their qualities is a great start. For instance you could tell a colleague;” your contribution was vital today in a meeting.”

Appreciation;

How do you show your colleague that you appreciate what they do? do you tell them? What else do you do to acknowledge the positive things they achieve? Often in the work place focus is put on the negatives. But if we show more appreciation for the many positives, workers will strive with all there potentials. Hence boosting work morale and relations.

Independence;

What choices do you have in how you do your work? How much choice do you offer others at work? When we provide choices, we are supporting others by giving them power and impendence in how they complete tasks. This enhances relationships and can lead to improved workplace functionality and productivity.

Responsibly;

Do you know your responsibility and how to meet them? How do you encourage others? How do you avoid going into the control mode? Remember adults don’t like being told what to do. So, how do you encourage responsibility without the telling?

Listening;

How can you listen deeply to your colleagues? Will you take more time to ask questions that open a conversation to know their opinions?

Understanding;

Do you really listen to understand your colleagues? Do you really know how they are and how they feel? If you take time to know more about staff, you will get to know more about them as human beings rather than just seeing what they do.

Trust worthy;

How much are you trusted? Are you faithful? Can you keep any secrets to your heart? Or you are this type of person that creates false stories on your colleague? People who are trustworthy are always coordinators in many issues. So, mind the way you treat others because they may treat you in the same way leading to good working relations

Support;

What support do you give or have at your workplace? How do you show support to other colleagues? What are you doing to support a culture of cooperation at work? When staffs feel supported, they are likely to take on new challenges and productivity can improve.

Organizations/firms or employers who base staff relations on the above can build much more coordination and cooperation at workplaces and reap the resulting benefits in better performance, productivity and profits.

By Evelyn-Ricnet.

Overwhelming Users turn up at E-Society this year 2011

2011-01-24T13:07:00.007+03:00

2011 has began as a year of tremendous change at the E-Society (Kasese district Local government).
The E-Society resource center with technical back up from RIC-NET , at the begining of this year became so busy that the staff decided to modify the timings for their users who at times wait out especially in the morning hours. This was found out as an indication that people are getting more light about the usage of ICT tools.

"I regret for having not known the existence of this wonderful service here earlier than this, but never the less am here still to utilise the facility.Thanks alot to the management for this wonderful initiative"said one of the students of the computer literacy class at the center (E-Society).
More students have been enrolling for these classes almost everyday to get knowledge about the use of web 2.0 tools and computer applications. These students among others include primary school heads and their teachers, vaccation students, pastors and many more. the number has increased this year compared to last year.

There is hope that more and more users are coming besides the computer literacy class since the center offers other services like internet access to KDLG staff and the entire surrounding community, printing, photo copying, scanning, guidance and assistance to its users.

By Yosia B
ICTA

Information officer RIC-NET attend Uganda Community Libraries conference in masaka by Timothy

2011-01-17T10:39:00.004+03:00

Information officer -RIC-NET (left with computer) attend a two days Uganda Community Libraries conference that takes off today the 17th January 2011 in masaka. The objective of this conference is to encourage Ugandan communities into a culture of reading to enrich the knowledge base of the country. The conference is supported by Uganda community libraries a national organization based in Kampala. About 60 participants all over Uganda who are running community libraries and resource centres have been invited. Ric-Net together with its county center Information Busongara has also attended the conference. more to come

Ric-net staff train KALI coordinator on how to skype

2011-01-12T12:43:00.003+03:00

"Its wonderful to work in an IT organization" these were the words of the coordinator KALI Ms Betty K as she received skype training from masereka Abdul the driver of RIC-NET. RIC-NET has for the last two years using web 2.0 tools to share information within and outside the Rwenzori region.

RIC-NET in its 2011 strategic plan has planned to train all its partners organization on how to use Web 2.0 tools to share information from their field activities and programs
by Masereka Abdul

RIC-NET Efforts recognized world wide

2010-12-22T11:38:00.003+03:00

I was impressed when randomly searching for some thing about Kasese on the internet i landed on some news about some of our activities we are conducting. This was written about the E-Society project being run in Kasese District. To make matters interesting, the writter thought the project is being run in Rwanda. The rest of the details were fine. This clearly shows that someone who wrote about this does not know much about the E-Society which to me is interesting.

We have already contacted the editor of the platform to correct the article. Below is the link to the news platform.

http://www.balancingact-africa.com/news/en/issue-no-535/internet/internet-news-in-brief

Compiled By

Bwambale Edwin

RIC-NET conducts e-society stakeholders

2010-12-16T17:33:00.002+03:00

John B. Thawite

15 December 2010
KASESE district is finalising an internet-based, facility, the first of its kind in the Rwenzori region, that will enable the district administration and her stakeholders to electronically share information online.This will enable the district administration to store, retrieve and disseminate various documents among stakeholders in and outside the district, including central government and the donors.
The facility, known as the electronic society (e-society) centre, is housed in the District Information Office. It also comprises an electronic library (e-library) where the district will upload and retrieve its documents including procurement and job application information, development plans, budgets, various reports, minutes of council and departmental proceedings.The facility based and managed by the district, is funded by the Netherlands-based International Institute for Communication and Developments (IICD) through the Rwenzori Information Centres Network (RIC-NET).
The e-society and the e-library can be accessed via the district website, http://www.kasese.go.ug, which RIC-NET has also helped reactivate.

"The facility is so far the first of its kind in the Rwenzori region," the RIC-NET programme manager, John Silco Muruga, said at Hotel Margherita in Kasese Municipality on Friday.