Current projects
Enhancing Access to Finance and Agricultural services for Young Farmers
Partner USAID/Civil Society Strengthening Activity (CSSA)
Project Duration
2021 – Current
With support from USAID/CSSA, YOFCHAN has established a Youth Agricultural Park in Nwoya district with farming blocks to facilitate collaborative farming efforts and leverage on numbers to enhance youth access to 30% PDM loans and services such as extension services, bulking facilities, irrigation, markets, value addition, quality input, and access to tractor services.
YOFCHAN intends to establish a common user facility for youth to add value to their agricultural products and sell collectively to fetch high prices for their products. Additionally, YOFCHAN is working towards establishing a Youth Savings and Credit Cooperative (SACCO), to address the financial needs of youth champions.
Impact
A youth agricultural park has been established in Nwoya district to facilitate collaborative farming efforts and enhance access to services such as extension services, bulking facilities, irrigation, markets, value addition, quality input, and access to tractor services.
Youth Agricultural Park (YAP)
Uganda faces challenges with its rapidly growing population, especially concerning youth unemployment, despite the agricultural sector’s potential for job creation. Access to finance and resources for youth interested in agricultural production and value addition is limited due to various barriers including high collateral requirements and bureaucratic processes.
To address this, YOFCHAN proposes a project aiming to enhance youth investments in agriculture in Nwoya district. The project’s goal is to improve collaboration between youth and local government to access loans and services, as well as to enhance entrepreneurship capacity in agriculture.
Currently,
The YAP is on 60 acres in Nwoya district. It solves a number of issues for youth which include; Limited access to land through collaborative farming that is, 4 youth are able to farm on one acre of land among others.
Watermelon and Maize are currently grown on the park.
1000+
Direct beneficiaries
1
Milling facility for value addition
300+
Indirect beneficiaries
1
Cold storage facility for vegetables
Past project
Youth Inspiring Youth in Agriculture Initiative (YIYA)
Partner
Food and Agriculture Organisation of the United Nations (FA0)
Project Duration
2 years (2017-2019)
A competitive process was used to identify and select the youth in agriculture across the country. We rolled out a call for applications, young people accessed the forms and applied through the district office or online through the website.
We screened the applications & shortlisted the selected youth, who were visited on their premises by a team of judges to validate their work. The final champions were taken through capacity building training on business support, mindset shift, value addition among other topics.
Impact
Five youth champions from the first cohort have been able to access a capital of more than USD 40,000, thanks to the linkages created by the initiative with UNDP and other support programs. We continue liking them to more financial support.
Young Farmers Champions Network 