In Luwero district in rural Uganda, we are so excited that a new partnership with Heifer International will bring even more dignity and “wekembe” to our families. Over the next three years 740 families will receive goats and vegetable, bean and nut seeds and fruit seedlings for passion fruit, oranges and mangoes. We can already see those new trees blossoming along with this project!

The 740 families join 20 other families already benefiting from Just Like My Child’s Project Grace Initiative. Project Grace empowers rural Ugandans to create and sustain businesses.

The 740 families help support about 5000 men, women and children in this area of rural Uganda. They will be trained in animal husbandry, building and managing the animal pens, business building/savings, and other skills. As their businesses and animals grow, the families will proudly pass on more goats and business acumen to other families in Heifer’s “Pass on the Gift” model.

Anatolia will be one of our first Project Grace superstars to help other families succeed. When we first met Anatolia, all she wanted was the freedom to live out the rest of her days in peace. Now she has a bright future and enough money to pay for her children’s education. Anatolia has bred and sold two pigs – for a $30 profit. She’s wisely re-invested most of her profits into other pigs and pens to grow her business. She shows her children each day what empowerment looks like.

“My dream now: to build up my project to a level that I can provide for my family for generations to come,” Anatolia says. “I want to ensure that my children and grandchildren are happy and healthy and have the opportunities for a good education. I’d also like to repair my family home, so it’s suitable for my family far into the future. I am now confident that we will all have access to proper hygiene, health care and good nutrition.”

Now that’s what we call “Wekembe!”

Many in Jillian’s community in the Luwero district north of the capital of Kampala have long given up of the hope of any justice. They assume that the laws only exist to protect the wealthier in Kampala, where 95 percent of Ugandan attorneys live.

But Jillian’s wiser and more empowered. She knew about her rights because her community had participated in our game-changing, groundbreaking Project Justice program.

John Baptist provides training to guardians on creating a Will in Kikoiiro

Project Justice provides rural Ugandans with greater knowledge of and access to judicial information and processes to strengthen the legal safety net, especially for vulnerable women and children, like Jillian (not her real name). Now she is protected, no longer living at home and has escaped an early marriage- if not much worse.

In rural Uganda, most people remain ignorant of most criminal and civil laws and how to uphold them. Couples don’t even know if they are legally married. They view their children, as “property” yet does not know if they even legally own their land and homes. They lose hope and are vulnerable to crime, anarchy, and terrorism.

We demand and work for change. With the African organization FIDA, weaving in legal and medical personnel and community members, we’ve helped people protect themselves from crime, fraud, and abuse by investing in:

• Paralegal training of legal and medical personnel (more than 1,000 trained so far in 50 rural communities)
• Processes that allow people to immediately access counseling, medical and legal intervention, and report all crimes to the legal authorities
• Practices that allow the expedition of the collection of proper medical evidence, reporting, documentation, and legal prosecution according to Ugandan laws
• Personal training so people feel empowered, confident and secure in seeking legal help

It’s hard for us to imagine the legal and human atrocities that constitute daily reality in Africa. Yet they also represent an opportunity for widespread cultural change. Where rape is often not considered a crime or women are tossed out of their homes for not cooking well, we have to stop looking away. Where children are often viewed as property, or forced as young as 12 into prostitution—we have to act now.

The world won’t change and people won’t claim and exercise their rights if the legal system and widespread access to it doesn’t. Help us fuel this justice movement at Just Like My Child Foundation.

For centuries, Ugandan women and girls have been forced to meekly kneel before men. We are so proud of Nyiraguhabwa Monica, who is teaching our girls to stand proud and treat themselves with the greatest respect.

Monica is helping girls embrace life skills and empowered choices that will help them navigate the rest of their lives. Monica designs and leads our Girl Power workshops, which teach hundreds of young women that they have the right to live their lives without being harassed, exploited, or hurt. And that they can choose to attend school or work without persecution.

Monica’s work couldn’t be more urgent. Save the Children estimates that two children each hour are defiled in Uganda.

One of Just Like My Child’s students was raped and impregnated. The rapist’s family tried to “erase” the abuse by giving the child’s family a cow — and her family accepted it as the only kind of justice available to them.

Vivian Glyck knew in that moment that she had to launch a program that would strengthen, protect, and empower future girls, and convinced Monica to train hundreds of girls ages 9 to 13 via the Girl Power Project. Those girls now are becoming more confident and bold, knowing THEY may be Uganda’s next leaders.

We live for those days when the girls say things like, “I discovered ways of building my self esteem” or “I unlearned the mentality that men are stronger than women!”

Thank you Monica, for making the Girl Power Project a force with which to be reckoned! Monica will be joining us remotely from Uganda for our Hand Up, Never a Handout Celebration!

Join us October 13 for an unforgettable evening of hope, inspiration, education and FUN!!

The beads are selling upwards of 20+ dollars and range from bracelets to necklaces here on that busy coastal street.  Don’t get me wrong I do love those beads and I wear mine everyday. We here at Just Like My Child Foundation sell  (and sometimes raffle) them at our events to use for our program funding and I often give them as gifts but I would rather give the Ugandan women goats. I would rather give them a business they can grow and sell in their own back yard. This way she can depend on her own destiny and her own business prowess, rather than depending on people half a world a way to continue creating demand for inventory.

The beads will become a commodity here and with a lot of inventory the prices will have to plummet to get rid of the extra pieces, which just furthers poverty in Uganda as well as makes the women and young girls dependent on another’s supply chain. Our purchasing habits are at best fickle and the Ugandan ladies have no control over our buying power. This is why we have teamed up with Bishop Asili Hospital and created Project GRACE. Project GRACE is a microenterprise program that provides a small loan (poultry or livestock, and goats) with intensive training to help create a self-sustaining business that will support Ugandan families.

The beads are beautiful, unique, and not always easy to come by; however, neither are goats in Uganda. Take some time and read about Project GRACE and how we have created sustainable businesses and practices for rural Ugandan families.  You can also send a goat to a family in Uganda, check out how here.  Also, please share with us your thoughts on the subject.

You know how every time you go to a conference; you’re given a mass-produced tote bag with the logo of the sponsoring organization?

Well, this year, Traffic Geyser, Inc. did something a little different — and it created a BIG change. Exhibiting it’s commitment to global consciousness, Traffic Geyser purchased conference bags for its Social Media Marketing Machines event from women at the Asili Hospital in Uganda who are on AIDS treatment and ready to come back to life!

Each bag is handmade, and through this income-generating project women are sending their children to school and supporting their families. Each bag represents a woman whose heavy load has been lifted just a little bit by being given the opportunity to create her own solutions.

But Traffic Geyser didn’t stop there! The Social Media Marketing Machines event and Main Street Marketing Machines events were held this past Spring and helped raise enough money for the Just Like My Child Foundation to purchase a desperately-needed new vehicle for Asili Hospital in Uganda, invest in small businesses for over 500 families recovering from AIDS, and helped to fund badly-needed medical equipment!

Entrepreneurs on this side of the world helping entrepreneurs on the other side of the world to be self-sustaining are one of the fastest ways to alleviate poverty. So thank you, Traffic Geyser!

For more information please contact us by clicking here or just donate here.

My husband, an entrepreneur, was so blown away by how we’re helping to create thousands of entrepreneurs on the other side of the world, that he created this video:

And he’s helped us to raise thousands of dollars to give people the hope, dignity, and freedom of economic independence. You can too by clicking here, just a little goes a long way in Uganda.

Here is a surprising answer to the question of what costs Africa $12 billion a year in economic loss. Malaria.  Every 45 seconds a child in Africa dies from malaria.

In the U.S. we might think that malaria is similar to many other diseases – it is preventable and treatable.  So why does it contribute to so many deaths and costs Africa billions of dollars?  Because Just Like My Child has been working in Uganda for four years now we are painfully and sometimes personally aware of the affects of malaria and we assume everyone knows what we know.

I was recently asked the question of why Africa has one of the highest rates of  malaria-related deaths.  Why there and not here?  What makes the U.S. and other nations less susceptible?  That is when I realized sometimes I take for granted the education I have received through my work in Uganda.  Those “simple” questions spurred the content for this blog post.

Malaria is typically found in warmer regions of the world such as tropical countries with consistently higher temperatures.    Therefore many areas in sub-Saharan Africa are ideal climates for malaria-carrying mosquitos.  So you might think that tropical parts of the U.S. would have the same problems.  The fact is that states like Florida did suffer from high rates of malaria. However, the U.S. Government made a concerted effort to eliminate malaria through spraying of DDT in the 1950s. Environmentalists argued against DDT, but no one can argue against saving the lives of millions of children. Many experts would agree that malaria could be drastically reduced in sub-Saharan Africa through focused political will and financial commitment on the part of indigenous and international governments.  Visit http://www.3billionandcounting.com/ for a controversial yet thought-provoking discussion on this topic.

Another reason why Africa suffers more than most areas from malaria is a result of its vicious cycle of poverty.  If you start with an impoverished developing country and add a deadly disease that is easily transmittable from insect to human with medical aid miles away, you are destined to see a struggle not likely found in other countries.

Malaria is a drain on the already impoverished communities of Africa.  The more often a family suffers from malaria the more a parent has to choose taking care of the child over working.  The less money they make, the fewer the opportunity to get access to preventive medicine and education in very rural areas.

The largest population of children in Uganda and many adults cannot wait for new treatments to be distributed.  In many cases, the drugs will not find their way to the most rural areas without additional resources for doing so.

At Just Like My Child we are constantly improving the means and methods for reaching the children most susceptible to severe malaria illness and death.  Our reach is expanding and through improved education about prevention and distribution for protective nets we are making progress.

These proven protective nets are an inexpensive way to protect a child, improve a family and provide opportunities for a community.  A $100 donation will help 30 individuals to a change the course of a cycle of poverty to one of self-reliance.

Please donate today at:  https://secure.groundspring.org/dn/index.php?aid=26195&Itemid=108

When we first met Anatolia she said that all she wanted was the freedom to live out the rest of her days in peace, raise her children and her animals in order to secure a bright future for her whole family. She has done just that and now will have enough money to pay for her children’s education. Like so many mothers, Anatolia wants the best for her children and for them to want for nothing. Anatolia is taking action to break the cycle of poverty and showing her children (and grandchildren) what empowerment looks and feels like.

In my previous blog, Project GRACE: Micro-enterprising to Achieve Self Reliance in Uganda, I shared a video and details about how our program is providing families like Anatolia’s with the tools to create, manage and profit from their own business. For thousands of these families the physical effects of HIV/AIDS and/or the stigma associated with it prevents the adults from being able to support their families.

Through Just Like My Child Foundation’s work with Bishop Asili Hospital, mothers and fathers are provided with the necessary treatment, and Project GRACE empowers them to become self-reliant: through micro-enterprise. Through a loan of poultry of livestock along with training, these impoverished families can create a self-sustaining business that gives them hope and pride.

Project GRACE is giving HIV families a second chance and a step up not a hand out. It brings me great joy to share Anatolia’s heartwarming success story that your funds to Project GRACE have made possible.

Thank you to those of you who continue to support our efforts with your donations.

$300 provides an entire family of 6 with a complete sustainable business. Invest TODAY in Just Like My Child and help us empower communities to achieve self-sustenance and break the cycle of poverty.

What would you do if you were told you were sitting on billions of gallons of oil? You might feel as though you had won the lottery – excited and nervous as you planned your new life of wealth. Now consider that after finding out you struck oil, the government told you the oil harvesting deals had to go through them. They would make profits off your oil and invest the money on your behalf and in your best interest … AND you would not see the terms of the contracts. So much for transparent business dealings.

That’s pretty much what’s happening in Uganda. The country is sitting on a lot of newly-discovered oil, yet it’s unclear how its long-suffering people will benefit from this discovery of resources. Uganda could become an important player in oil exportation and recipient of an enormous amount of foreign funds. However the country is also known for not being effective or efficient in its fight against corruption. One investigative reporter is looking to make a change to this pattern, legally.

Angelo Izama is “suing to force the government to make its production sharing agreements with oil companies public.” Izama explains, “Every Ugandan knows that public money is stolen. The government of the day is like Dracula in charge of the blood bank, it is not exactly rocket science that oil money, just like donor money or tax payers money can be stolen.”

The government contends that based on issues that have previously arisen with Nigerian oil agreements President Yoweri Museveni will not let Uganda suffer the same fate. He has “insisted on a refinery in Uganda to help this landlocked country become energy independent.”

Uganda may not see any of the desperately-needed changes in their infrastructure as a result of this new revenue stream for years to come. The vast majority of its population lives on less than $2 per day. Every day is a dire emergency for so many families. Yet, commercial production of the oil is expected to take place in the last quarter of 2011 with no estimation of when profits will be released, reported and used for the betterment of the communities.

While all of this gets sorted out, rural communities of Uganda need help now. They need medical supplies, education and micro-enterprising opportunities to fight their way out of poverty and become self-reliant. You can help by supporting the efforts of Just Like My Child Foundation – your money goes directly to the medical patients, families and agricultural programs. https://secure.groundspring.org/dn/index.php?aid=26195&Itemid=108

Quotes excerpted from CNN article, “Will Ugandan’s benefit from country’s new oil find?”

African women in their early 20s represent the largest group of the adult population infected with HIV. One of the causes is that their sexual partners refuse to wear condoms. This refusal is often a death sentence for the female partner. So how can infections be reduced among these women? Some might say that education is the key. The education exists, but often the women lack the power to influence their partner’s choices. African women have not had much control over the prevention of HIV, but now there is hope.

South African scientists released exciting results of a clinical trial that a new vaginal gel containing antiretroviral drugs offers women a strong level of protection and a greater degree of control against HIV infection.

Conducted in South Africa’s KwaZulu-Natal province by Prof Salim Abdool Karim and his wife Quarraisha, the clinical trial results showed that using the gel reduced the risk of HIV infection by 39 per cent overall among women, but for those who used it most consistently the protection rate was 54 per cent. It is forecasted that over the next 20 years, the gel could prevent as many as 1.3 million new infections and 800,000 deaths in South Africa.

The scientists are working to conduct the third and final stage of the trial, which is estimated to take “a number of years” to complete.

The effectiveness of this protective gel is very encouraging news for the HIV epidemic in South African and for the opportunity for women to have more control over preventing the disease.

The reality of the situation is that although the study was done on a large portion of rural African women, the challenge throughout much of Africa, is that often there is a long delay between breakthroughs like this and its distribution throughout the rural communities where it is needed most.

As I’ve often said, the devil is in the details in Africa. We’ve had anti-retro-viral drugs to combat AIDS for years now, yet the education, investment, and distribution of the drugs is an intense process. It requires deep commitment on the part of the communities on the ground and the aid organizations which finance and distribute them. We need to commit ourselves to making these types of breakthroughs accessible not just in the urban areas. Yes, education is important, but often access for all is the key to the exciting results that are possible.

As I have mentioned in earlier posts, there is a stigma in Uganda surrounding families with HIV which results in joblessness and poverty. The more women who can prevent contracting HIV, the better their family’s chances to be self reliant.

For those families who have already contracted HIV, Just Like My Child Foundation along with the Bishop Asili Hospital is helping them become self-sufficient through a micro-enterprise program called Project Grace. To learn more about Project Grace, go to my previous post Project Grace: Achieving Self Reliance in Uganda (link) and watch the inspiring video.

For more details about the study, read the full article here.