Sarah Creates A Successful Shop, Uganda
Sarah, a senior in a vocational school, lives with her mother and grandmother. To support her family and to meet her own needs, Sarah started her gardening project – growing green peppers and eggplants. However, due to spraying the wrong pesticide, Sarah lost her crop. But, she has laid another nursery for eggplants and green peppers. Her income project is important for Sarah so that she can afford basic necessities like jelly, soap, clothes, and sanitary towels.
While waiting for her crops to grow, Sarah suggested to her mother and grandmother that they open a shop, selling items from their farm. The older women welcomed the idea and supported Sarah in opening a store where they sold matooke, yellow bananas, sugarcanes, and cabbage from their farm. Sarah helps her mother run the store and they have been able to expand to stocking other items like soda and tomatoes. Her mother is now a self-employed shopkeeper.
Sarah is happy because, through her ventures, she has gained skills which can make her a successful entrepreneur. But she is most happy because her elders listened to her and embraced her ideas, instead of dismissing her ideas because of her age and gender.
Sarah’s success motivates her to be innovative and creative to see that she changes her family’s life for the better. Sarah encourages other girls to speak up and not be afraid to share their ideas with their parents, which can prove life changing for the entire family.
Sarah is a group leader in the adolescents’ empowerment cells and she encourages her fellow group members to focus on their education, despite the fact that they are at home, keep themselves safe, and to respect their bodies by avoiding pregnancy and contracting diseases like AIDS.
She has participated in distribution of flyers with messages about Gender Based Violence, Teenage pregnancy, conflict resolution, and managing stress in her community. Sarah is happy to have joined Asante Africa Foundation club because she has been able to discover a lot about herself.
