As she browses the Internet at the Nabweru Community Multimedia Centre (CMC) computer lab, Lovincer Nabanja recounts how the facility has enabled her to acquire computer and business skills leading to better management of her restaurant.
“The centre greatly helped and now I can use it to run my restaurant and outside catering service,” Nabanja pauses to tell me.
“With the Internet, I learn new ideas on the day to day operations of my business, customer care and log onto the foodnet.com to know the current prices of fresh food items for the restaurant, besides savings skills,” the 46-year-old single mother said.
“I used to spend a lot to transport the daily supplies needed at the restaurant but now I just use my mobile phone to call and they are delivered,” she says.
Nabanja whose success has seen her expand her business by opening an outside catering service for all kinds of parties has managed to see her three children through tertiary education as a result of her hard work.
“Before I joined the centre in 2002 as an adult leaner, my children had almost failed to complete university education because I did not have enough money for tuition. Through Nabweru CMC, I have had them finish and I am now paying school fees for my grandchildren. I used to make a daily profit of Shs5,000 ($2.8) per day compared to Shs25,000 ($14) that I earn today of which I save Shs10,000 ($5.7) on my account in Allied Bank,” Nabanja revealed.
Suleiman Senyonga, another beneficiary of the centre and owner of Senyonga, Sendegeya and Sons Metal Works says the centre has enabled him to acquire computer and business management skills and making friendships over the Internet with metal workers across the globe with whom he shares business ideas. Seated in his office in the busy Jua Kali section of Katwe, a Kampala suburb, Senyonga said: “The centre has helped me in various ways. There is a time I thought I was independent and self reliant, but when I joined the centre in 1999, I learnt that two heads are better than one. If we can work together and collaborate with our counterparts with better technology in South Africa and India, we shall realise development.”
Promoting development
It’s at the centre that Senyoga developed the idea of forming the Katwe Small Scale Industrial Development Association (KASSID) in 2005 to bring all the Jua Kali artisans together. KASSID now boosts of 230 members. “We all need each other for an integrated business strategy,” Senyoga said. He says he still uses the facilities at the centre to receive fax messages and typeset documents related to his metal fabrication business.
His sales have gone up as a result of learning new business ideas. “Before I joined, I made a profit of Shs1 m ($571) every six months and now I take home Shs5 m ($2,857) every six months. My clients are mainly individuals who buy my fabricated windows, doors, gates, brick making machines, fences and many others,” he revealed.
Nabanja and Senyonga are among several of the Nabweru CMC beneficiaries that have acquired Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) knowledge on improved farming techniques, child rights, entrepreneurship skills, and computer training, and indicated that they have been able to put this knowledge and skills to use which has greatly improved their performance.
Education in the targeted areas has been positively impacted with evidence of better performances in schools. Reference materials for teachers are more readily available and more teachers and students can access the centres for research purposes. Some resource centres have triggered a reading culture especially among the young and school going youth.
Students now use the centres as a reading place as well as a meeting point. The library services are normally offered free of charge. Parents have taken the initiative to register with the resource centres to personally borrow books for their children. On the political scene, all CMCs have aroused several reactions in the community.
“Communities that were apolitical have now picked up interest in the governance and management of their areas and resources.
Women have evidently been influenced into taking up more active roles in the management of their communities with several reports of the women taking up local council positions – which was previously unheard of,” an Evaluation and Impact Assessment Study on the pilot project for the establishment of the National Network of CMCs in Uganda carried out between December 2005 and January 2006 observed.
It’s now evident that teachers, students and community members have more access to information moreover cheaply. “Most users were satisfied with the information they received from the CMCs and felt that it was appropriate for their needs,” the study adds.
Source: The Monitor
