Livelihood Skills | Wetland Conservation | Cultural Heritage | Community Development
Jacana Project
Jacana is a community-led initiative in Kabale, in Uganda’s Kigezi highlands, with a clear mission: to rescue school dropouts from the cycle of generational poverty by giving them livelihood skills, reconnecting them to nature and culture, and restoring their place in community life.
Across Kigezi families face impossible choices: who goes to school and who stays home. Hunger, long distances to school, early pregnancy, child labour and early marriage push many children out of the classroom. In Uganda an estimated 45% of primary learners and 30% of secondary learners leave school before completing their studies. Left without skills or opportunity, too many youths fall into exploitative work, addiction or early parenthood.
Jacana’s solution is hands-on, hopeful and rooted in place. We empower rural youth (ages 15–30) especially those who are orphaned, poor, and from minority groups or living with disabilities, in practical trades that suit the region and its ecosystems: boat-building, skills, traditional crafts from bamboo, reeds and papyrus; carpentry and woodwork; sustainable organic farming, eco-tourism, and wetland conservation. Our training Centre will be sited at lake Bunyonyi and Nyombe Swamp (about 60 km from Kabale town), where the landscape itself becomes a classroom.
The jacana bird walks on lily pads, light, adaptable and at home on water. We use that image to teach resilience: graduates become “water walkers,” able to adapt, care for their families, protect wetlands, and build businesses from local resources. Our model combines vocational training with cultural storytelling, community inclusion, and market access: trainees sell crafts, coffee and build boats. Bamboo planting and native tree restoration are integral: they prevent erosion, supply sustainable materials for crafts, and rebuild the lake’s habitat.
Our Pilot Project.
We are launching our first pilot workshop of 10 youth trainees between 15-30 years old in January 2026, school dropouts from rural communities will begin this journey, and after, 20 youths annually.
The project will start with 5 males, and 5 females, these will be the pioneers who will take over trainings for the next intakes.
They will be trained in boat building skills, bamboo crafts, woodwork, wetland land conservation, traditional crafts, culture, eco-tourism, and organic farming. The project will start also a tree, and bamboo nursery bed, that will act as our classroom for environment, and wetland conservation.
How to partner with us
Funding youth scholarships, tools, workshop infrastructure, securing space/land, nursery bed, tree, and bamboo seedlings, trainer fees, Jacana operational costs.
Volunteers bring technical training, business skills, tourism and hospitality expertise, tree planting, and cultural training, and heritage documentation.
Together we can turn school dropouts into skilled, proud custodians of nature and culture, and make the Water Walker Village sustainable, community-owned model of rural transformation
Bring health to those who need it most!
In the hills of Kabale, many families live hours away from the nearest health facilities. Mothers give birth at home without skilled care. Children die from treatable illnesses. Elderly people endure pain in silence because medicine is out of reach.
Jacana envision to bring health, hope, and dignity closer to those who need it most, and provide primary care, maternal and child health services, health education, and mobile outreach clinic to remote communities around Lake Bunyonyi. Our dream is to build a fully equipped center that ensures no one suffers or dies because they are poor or too far from help.
Inclusive Education nearer to communities
In the steep hills, and deep valleys of Kabale, the road to education is long and painful. Most young children walk over 5-10 kilometers each day to reach the nearest school, hungry, tired, and often barefoot. For the weak, very young, and children with disabilities, the journey is impossible. Many never start school at all, while others drop out before learning to read or write. Jacana initiatives bring learning closer to home by build community learning centers, and support inclusive education so that every child regardless of distance, poverty, or disability has the chance to learn, dream, and grow. When education reaches the hills, the future rises with it.
Your support can help build classrooms, train teachers, and keep vulnerable children in school.
JACANA CONTACT ADDRESS
Plot 64 Kabale-Kisoro-Road.Kabale district, Kigezi Region, Uganda.
+256773714886
+256755858047
Email: info@jacanaafrica.org
Volunteers:
Email: volunteers@jacanaafrica.org
+256775687510
