About Inititiative for Rural Development - Uganda (IRD - U)

The Initiative was initiated in 2012 with an aim of promoting democracy, human rights and enterprise skills among the rural youth and women in Uganda. Uganda has a huge potential for poverty reduction with huge resources ranging from minerals, tourism, a young population to a good climate. Agriculture remains the biggest economic activity which attracts over 80% of the population either directly or indirectly employed by the sector although it is highly at subsistence levels.  Despite all its huge potential for poverty reduction, Uganda remains a poor country with a big percentage of the population surviving on less than a dollar a day because the population especially those living in the rural areas is not empowered to ensure that their resources are well utilised by leaders and technocrats entrusted with service delivery to the people.

The unemployment rate among the youth remains high due to limited enterprise skills and despite its fertile soils and good climate, the country continues to suffer widespread poverty and food scarcity.  Uganda faces widespread corruption and poor policy implementation at almost all levels of implementation. World Bank in its 2010 report estimates that between 500 to 800 million Uganda shillings is lost annually to corruption by public officials.

Widespread corruption has mostly affected rural grass roots especially the marginalised population groups of rural women and youth since it’s them who are affected most when funds meant for road construction, medicine in hospitals, market development, agricultural development is misused by public officials. 

IRD - U heavily focuses its attention on empowering the marginalised population groups of rural youth and women on issues of democracy, human rights and enterprise skills development.

Mission Statement

To empower rural youth and women improve their livelihoods through improved participation in governance, advocate for their rights and developing their enterprise skills.

Strategic Objectives

1.      To build the capacity of rural youth and women participate in governance and advocate for their rights through trainings and sensitisation. 

2.      Build the capacity of the youth and women to create wealth through enterprise training and development with a focus on agriculture and literacy trainings

3.      To empower rural women and youth use media and other ICT platforms to improve their livelihoods through trainings in citizen journalism, mobile phone technologies, mainstream media like FM radio and social media.

4.      To provide both physical and online platforms for rural youth and women to enable them fully participate in governance and advocate for their rights.

5.      To conduct appropriate research and provide consultancy services aimed at ensuring the sustainability of the institution

Program areas

1.      Transparency and Accountability Program. It will focus on empowering rural women and youth participate in governance through demanding accountability for improved service delivery for improved service delivery in key sectors like agriculture, health, education, infrastructure, etc.

2.      Human Rights Program. It will focus on empowering rural women and youth advocate for their rights especially the right to access information, health rights, media rights, gender rights and right to participate in government planning, budgeting and decision making processes.

3.      Enterprise Development Program. This will focus on training and sensitisation of rural women and youth in enterprise skills development. The key areas in this program will include financial literacy, commercial farming, market access, ICTs and entrepreneurship.

4.      Using ICTs for Development Program. This program will focus on using appropriate ICT tools for the development of marginalised communities in Uganda. It will involve the use of both traditional like radio and modern ICT tools like interactive social media tools e.g facebook, twitter, blogs, etc

5.      Consultancy and research Program. This program will focus on consultancy services in research, advocacy, institutional development, Monitoring and Evaluation and training in ICTs to generate resources for the sustainability of the institution and also building the capacities of member institutions and individuals.