75 youth-led enterprises adopt value addition in Uganda
ENABLE-TAAT has organized an in-depth mentorship and capacity development exercise benefitting 75 youth in Kalangala, Uganda. Many of the beneficiaries are enterprise owners at different levels in various value chains. The learning exercise aimed to inspire the youth to generate income through the various food commodities available under the Technologies for African Agricultural Transformation (TAAT) program. They would afterward scale their ideas, dreams, and businesses across Africa’s agricultural sector.
Field activities during training in Kalangala.
This interaction covered seed multiplication, seed bulking, the practice of proper agronomic methods, and integrated pest and disease control management, with which the participants were already involved. However, many beneficiaries were more excited about value-addition activities such as baking donuts, daddies, crisps, and chapati using orange-fleshed sweet potato (OFSP). The prospect of making huge profits through value-added products increased the participants’ enthusiasm.
Participants in a breakout session discussing preferred commodities.
They also learned to process sweet potato roots and vines into animal feed, usually discarded in farms. A few of them who have been practicing value addition were asked to share their success stories to motivate the participants.
The exercise concluded with participants learning to develop business plans for their agribusiness ventures. They created marketable ideas to address community challenges such as nutrition benefits and health values, processing, marketing strategies, and attitude changes, among others.
ENABLE-TAAT continues to provide mentorship for all the beneficiaries and facilitating linkage to funding using their business plans.
