Denis Ouman
I want to become Uganda’s biggest supplier of rabbit meat.  I sustained a spinal cord injury that has left me disabled.  My core purpose is to serve the disabled not from a charity angle, but as an employee and consumer.  An AVODA  scholarship will get me started on my career.

My business core purpose is to mainstream disability as an integral part of marketing across the world. In Uganda alone there are more than 6.5 million people living with some form of disability. These kinds of statistics directly translate into a huge consumer power base.

Gone are the days where persons with disability were looked at from a corporate social responsibility angle. We are genuine consumers of products and services. Big companies must be intentional on reaching out to this untapped market potential of disabled consumers. As a Christian, my company, therefore, seeks to break the silence, preach and promote equality amongst human beings before God with similar potential except for being differently abled.  

Pearl Katusiime
I didn’t grow up with my parents so sometimes it meant hustling.  I want to build an empire with my clothing brand.  African clothing is becoming attractive world-wide. My aspiration is to employ the unfortunate and those who have nothing because I know what it’s like to have nothing.  Work will bring food, shelter, dignity, and purpose to African friends.

I hope to transform my community and baptize my industry for God’s kingdom by encouraging and training my employees to eventually start their own companies: Invest more time working on your business. Start tracking everything concerning your business. Revisit your objectives. “Where there is no vision, the people perish, but blessed is he who keeps the law, happy is he.” Proverbs 29:18.

In addition, we must spend more time promoting our business, improving the quality of our products or services, experimenting with new products and methods of production, improving customer satisfaction while building a strong relationship with our communities. I believe the AVODA program will guide, direct, and help me reach my potential for my business.

Kenneth Kanzairwe
I am passionate about helping people know God, discover their purpose and use their God given gifts to change other people lives. Through education and agriculture, I hope to raise a generation of missional young people that can adequately respond to challenges within their communities. We currently have a school and agribusiness in Kampala. The goal is to use these as a model to scale to at least ten major towns in the next 25 years. The purpose of the agricultural projects is to financially support development of the schools and provide entrepreneurship and apprenticeship opportunities for students.

The 2013 Millennium Development Goals report by UNDP and the Government of Uganda, indicates that there are about 600,000 to 700,000 new entrants into the labor market each year in Uganda, and more than 95 percent of these are youths. However, it is estimated that out of these, only 9,000 find jobs. Quality of education is a huge contributing factor in addressing job creation and entrepreneurship, so as a school, we have adopted the Montessori curriculum to develop individual gifting, train independence and entrepreneurship in order to raise job creators and young entrepreneurs.

Parallel to the education of the mind, we will provide an intentional discipleship process for all people in our community. This we believe will help disciple our communities to know God better, discover their individual purpose and gifting to serve others.

Finally, one of our core values as a business is people. We want to serve the people in our communities by modelling and creating a work environment that is marked by authenticity, love, collaboration, dignity and respect for all. We hope that doing these three things above as a business community we will contribute to the transformation of our community and industry as a whole.

Rehemah Nanteza
Growing up was more like a struggle but fun! I grew up in a family of 4 children and I am the third born! I was raised by a single mother and this taught me a lot especially in areas of working for myself and becoming a stronger person and independent. Life was always about figuring out what to do to survive. I tried many different jobs until i saved a little money and started my own business! I have a shop of hair extensions in down town Kampala, and I have been running it since 2017.

The Lord has brought me in contact with many young and older people with whom I can connect. I am a very approachable person and this helps me connect with my customers and help them find their identity in Christ. To me my business is not just about making money, (yeah I love to make money!), but I also believe God has put me in this place to help the young girls who struggle with a number of issues.

As an AVODA student I want to learn better business principles, how to expand to a larger customer and employee base. Maybe even help another struggling young woman to start her own hair business.