The project will focus on fostering peaceful co-existence among cross-border communities and increasing incomes for vulnerable households through environmentally friendly livelihood options.
Among the key interventions of the project include the provision of water resources as an enabling dimension of peace and security, enhancing the functional capacity of peace committees, conducting community outreach on key developmental topics, facilitating cross-border cooperation, offering psycho-social support, implementing cash-for-work initiatives, delivering training in digital literacy and entrepreneurship, supporting small start-ups, providing vocational training for youth, refurbishing local economic centers, and integrating conflict-sensitive livelihood interventions into local government plans among others.
Charles Sserwanja, the Head of Public Health and Social Services at IRCU says that the council is actively involving leaders from diverse religious denominations to take a direct role in addressing challenges in the fight against HIV/AIDS and the spread of other illnesses within their congregations.
The Commissioner for Government Secondary Schools Sam Kuloba says many schools are suffering from erosion, people are displaced by natural disasters while extreme weather events make access to education very difficult.
Local authorities say that most of the NGOs are not following the unique weather pattern with most of them supplying their tree seedlings either too early or later and most times during the dry season.
The activity, ongoing at Naitakwae Play Ground in Moroto is expected to accord communities on the Kenya and Ugandan sides of the border opportunities for better co-operation, close coordination and peaceful coexistence. The MoU is also envisaged to bridge isolation gaps to improve livelihood and socio-economic conditions for sustainable peace and development in Karamoja, Turkana and West Pokot.
