In order to create self-employment opportunities, 133 adolescent girls and young women have received start-up kits after completing a three-month skills attainment scheme in tailoring and knitting, hair dressing and catering among others in Hoima District.
Assessed and crowned by the Directorate of Industrial Training (DIT) and after completion of a six-week internship placement, the beneficiaries under the Adolescent Girls and Young Women (AGYW) arrangement, have been given work tools in order to ease their post-skilling life by employing themselves.
Skills Sustainability Package (SSP) materials were handed out in line with one’s acquired skills as start-up capital including a set of sewing machine, six metres of draper, four sewing threads, a dozen lubricants, an apron and a pair of scissors among others for those skilled in tailoring.
A hair drier, a percolator, a 20-litre jerry can of shampoo, six rolls of weaves, a litre of weaving shampoo, a mirror, a basin and a bucket among others were given to each of those who were skilled in hair dressing programme at the function that took place at Hoima district headquarters in Kasiingo.
Drawn from Nile Vocation Institute Bishop Mukasa Centre under Bunyoro Kitara Diocese in Duhaga and, Millennium Business School and St Simon Vocation School under Hoima Catholic Diocese in Bujumbura all in Hoima city, 71 beneficiaries hail from Kitoba, 58 from Buhanika and four from Kigorobya sub-counties in Hoima district.
Ms Juliet Budola, a representative from The AIDS Support Organisation (TASO), urged the beneficiaries to use the start-up materials offered to them to promote positive change in their lives financially instead of selling them off.
The Prevention/Adolescent Officer at Baylor Uganda, Hoima Branch, Mr Senatori Hakizimana, revealed that besides this lot, those who have been trained in welding, motor repair and mechanics, plumbing, civil engineering, carpentry and joinery among others will also be given start-up tools for their respective specialities.
The Hoima Deputy Resident District Commissioner, Mr Michael Muramira Kyakashari, advised the beneficiaries to make proper use of the attained skills and the tools given to them and exhibit their potential to transform their socio-economic life.
