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African Development Bank Approves New Country Strategy Paper for Uganda

The Board of Directors of the African Development Bank Group (AfDB) has approved Uganda’s Country Strategy Paper (CSP) for 2017-2021, which focuses on infrastructure development for industrialization; skills and capacity development.

The CSP is expected to support the Government’s quest to transform Uganda into a prosperous and inclusive middle income economy as per its Vision 2040 and the National Development Plan 2 (NDP II). The CSP is articulated around the following two strategic pillars: (i) Infrastructure development for industrialization, and; (ii) Skills and capacity development.

The main objectives of Pillar 1 interventions are to reduce Uganda’s binding infrastructure bottlenecks and create a more enabling business climate by scaling-up selected investments and supportive non-lending activities to boost the country’s industrialization, employment and business creation activities in priority economic sectors.

The overarching objective of Pillar 2 is to contribute towards skilling the productive population, across all sectors of the society, with relevant job and business skills that will lead to increased employability and entrepreneurship and, hence, inclusive and green economic growth.

The CSP’s pillars are directly aligned with the core High-Five priorities and flagship programs of the Bank’s TYS (2013-2021), namely: Feed Africa – through interventions in boosting agricultural productivity and value chain activities; Light up and Power Africa; Integrate Africa – through the expansion of key transport corridor for boosting trade with regional and global markets; Industrialize Africa – through infrastructure investments to support transformation of Uganda’s agriculture into commercially viable agribusiness value-chains and boost industrial manufacturing value-addition; Improve peoples’ livelihoods – through providing essential infrastructure such as clean water and sanitation facilities, and boosting employment opportunities through skills and training activities.

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Global Partnership Award for Karamoja Primary Education Programme

Deloitte (Uganda) today presented the Irish Ambassador to Uganda with the Global Partnership Award (GPA) for the Best Education Project that the Karamoja Primary Education Programme won on May 11 in London, UK.

The GPA is the largest event recognising and rewarding the best in Public-Private Partnerships (PPP) Projects. Open to projects and companies around the globe, the annual event welcomes over 700 people to celebrate the industry’s achievements over the past year. This year’s event attracted over 100 entries from leading organisations and projects across Europe, Africa, Middle East, Australasia and Asia.

The Karamoja Primary Education Programme, funded by Irish Aid and managed by Deloitte (Uganda), in partnership with the Ministry of Education and Sports, Pro-Plan Partners and Turner & Townsend, saw the rehabilitation and upgrading of 21 Primary Schools in Karamoja.

The overall objective of the Programme was to deliver high-quality education facilities in Karamoja and to support equitable access to education. The Karamoja Primary Education Programme included infrastructure works (38 dormitories, 21 twin staff houses, 38 shower blocks, 21 VIP latrines); solar installations for 42 classrooms, 19 offices and 10 multipurpose buildings; almost 20KM of chain-linked fencing; rainwater harvesting for over 1m litres; the planting over 630 trees, and; the provision of furniture and educational materials.

The Programme that was implemented from August 2013 to November 2016 at a cost of €12.78m (almost Ushs 52 billon).

The Karamoja Primary Education Programme won the Global Partnership Award (GPA), from a strong shortlist of seven nominees, in recognition of its strong public private-partnership, its ability to respond to the needs of the local communities, and the way it overcame the challenges faced. The judges also welcomed the fact that some of the methods used in the management of the programme could be rolled out as a model for other such programmes in the future.

At today’s event the Ambassador of Ireland to Uganda, Dónal Cronin congratulated Deloitte (Uganda), Uganda’s Ministry of Education and Sports, Pro-Plan Partners and Turner & Townsend for the strong partnership in the successful implementation of the Karamoja Primary Education Programme.

“This is a fantastic global recognition for the innovative and responsive way in which the Programme was managed and implemented, delivering top-class education facilities for the Karamoja region” the Ambassador noted.

Adding that, “the Karamoja Primary Education Programme was chosen for the Gold Award from a strong shortlist, including education projects in France and the UK, but was able to shine brightest as a model of best practice because of how it has responded to education needs, how it was managed, and how the different stakeholders worked strongly together to get the results we see today.”

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