Agricultural Empowerment for Rural Farmers

Mr Charles lost his leg in motor accident in 2006, while he had a family of 7 to be taken care of, he was quite limited due to the disability caused, in 2015 Cosma organized farmers in Luuma village under Suubilyo farmers association ( SULFA) to which Charles got an opportunity to join and eventually became an member and leader. Through group savings, Charles got an opportunity to borrow and invest in a coffee farm but also accessed maize seeds to plant over two acres. Subsequently Charles was able to generate extra income to take back his children to school. Amidst COVID-19 crisis, Charles had almost lost hope in SULFA due to a drop in member savings and therefore no lending capital. Out of your donation to the Re-capitalizing 2000 rural farmers in Uganda (47086)   , SULFA borrowed up to $2000 which rejuvenated their lending to member farmers like Charles. SULFA is among five village cooperatives which benefited from the Cosma revolving fund which has impacted over 358 members.

With the same funds, Cosma was also able to distribute up to 200 kg ($300) of improved maize seed to different farmers in different Village cooperatives. This seed facility enabled planting of 20 acres of improved maize varriety with an expected crop yield over 20 metric tones valued at $4000

With the same funds, 55 youths were engaged in skills training in making hand bags, shoes and school books, and ready to start gainful employment

In the next year our target is to;

• Establish a digital management information system to track customer transaction; this will go a long way in improving the monitoring, reporting and recovery processes while reducing on administration costs.
• We are still operating below capacity in terms of farmer services (18%); We need to invest in the community fund to increase access to revolving cash loans and farm inputs
• Over 55 youths have been trained making handmade crafts, there is need to create startup grant to enable them start producing for the market and eventually gain income to save under village cooperatives

We are grateful to you our partners who heard our GlobalGiving fundraiser call and offered your trust in our model to cause  the above impact in the community. We look forward to more fruitful engagement soon

Yours in service

Cosma Team

Links:

• www.cosmadevelopments.com
• https://youtu.be/6BcMXytSr30