Climate Talk Uganda With Josephine Karungi

Irrigation and water management technologies have the potential to help farmers transition from seasonal production to year-round cultivation. They also enable farmers to withstand the worst impacts of climate change and unpredictable - and more extreme - weather events. Beth Nanyama is a Markey Systems Development Specialist who has been working with the Climate Smart Jobs project to increase acc...

Well-maintained machinery like tractors can be a lifeline for farmers preparing their land for cultivation. But sometimes maintaining and repairing this machinery can be time consuming and strewn with obstacles like the lack of spare parts. Fixing these challenges is a crucial part of helping farmers get their gardens planted in a timely way, before the end of the planting season. This in turn hel...

The Climate Smart Jobs program has been working with communication partners developing new approaches to covering climate change in the media. As I mention in my introduction to this episode, from Day One the project recognised that climate change information is only useful if it is accessible, understandable and delivered in ways that help people make informed decisions. One of our most significa...

This is a fantastic episode about women, shea, self-reliance, entrepreneurial energy and talent. It’s the story of Blessed Organic Release shea products, founded by our guest, Margaret Laloyo. As she says on the company website: ‘In 2004 I took note of an ‘international investor’ who was buying Shea butter and Shea kernels from local collectors, mostly impoverished rural women in my home area in A...

Artificial meat. Shampoo. Cooking oil. Flour. All the good things that come from shea. Raymond Kakuba is the National Co-ordinator of the Nilotica Shea Alliance, and has been working alongide the Climate Smart Jobs project. In this conversation he talks to us about shea products and the economic opportunities that shea cultivation represent for women in particular. (Nilotica, he says, is a premium...

Christopher Atibo is a business model specialist with the Climate Smart Jobs project. But he's a farmer to his bones. As his mother used to say, 'Let's go to work - if you don't work, you don't eat.' In this inspiring episode he tells us how the practice of pfumvudza is helping transfrom the fortunes of women in refugee settlements - and communities in general - in Northen Uganda. We hear how new...

Joining us in this episode are two of the key people who have been implementing the Uganda Climate Innovation Fund, Brian Ndyaguma and Tobby Ojok. The Climate Smart Jobs project developed the Uganda Climate Innovation Fund to support entrepreneurs coming up with sustainable, economically viable ways of helping local people become more resilient to the challenges of climate change in Northern Ugand...

Farmers in northern Uganda face many obstacles to success in the face of climate change. Shifting climatic patterns make planning extremely difficult, and access to markets and services is often inconsistent and beset with problems. The Climate Smart Jobs Project - the organisation behind this podcast - exists to design innovative ways of tackling these difficulties. Mathew Rupanga is the Team Lea...

A example of how the Climate Smart Jobs Program is having a positive impact, through the lens of Mme Milly Akello's experience in northern Uganda. Following on from our previous episode, ecosystems specialist Solomon Etany joins me in the studio to share the background to Mme Akello's story, and she tells us herself, with real passion and commitment, how the increasing cultivation of cocoa alongsi...

'Adag-anii means that we don't want rumours, we want to work.' Okullo Paul Peter is Managing Director of Adag-Anii Ltd , based in the the Lango sub-region of Uganda. In this chat he has a great story about how his company go its name - 'adag-anii.' He talks to us about helping farmers adapt to growing cocoa as a cash generating, environmentally responsible alternative to maize. In partnership with...

Batteries are a key technology for adapting to cimate change because they provide power on demand. Whether from solar, wind or wave, energy stored in batteries can be accessed at the flick of a switch. Brendan Cronin is CEO of Soleil Power in Kampala - East Africa’s first diversified lithium battery production company. He joins us in studio to explain a bit about how batteries work, how they're de...

This is the story of how Halima Nalunkuma decided to become a provider of agricultural materials - and knowledge - to farmers. And how she's now working with refugeee communities to encourage minimal tilling agricultural methods, leading to improved yields and increased economic wellbeing in those communities. And crucially, improving their resilience in the face of climate change. Halima Nalunkum...

Sometimes life happens while you're busy making other plans. Halima Nalunkuma wanted to be a banker and to 'wear shoes with pointy heels.' But while in Kiryandongo she saw an opportunity and grabbed it with both hands. This is the story of how she's now working with refugeee communities to encourage minimal tilling agricultural methods, leading to improved yields and increased economic wellbeing i...

Mulching. Doesn't sound so...exciting. But trust me, this is a totally compelling conversation. It's about 'Pfumvudza,' a conservation-based approach to agriculture that makes small parcels of land more productive through minimum tillage, mulching, crop rotation, and timely planting. Because it is focused on small plots of land, it can be especially effective in helping smallholder famrers and oth...

To enable smallholder farmers to become resilient to climate change, they must be encouraged to view farming as a business. That's the key thrust of the argument put forth by Hon Chance Kabaghe in this episode of Climate Talk Uganda. While visiting Uganda as a guest of the Climate Smart Jobs Initiative, Hon Chance Kabaghe's draws on his experience as an agricultural economist, large scale farmer,...

Agroecology, explains Josephine Akia Luyimbazi of PELUM, is a systematic approach to agriculture that is based on working in harmony with nature and natural processes. In this wide ranging conversation she details the work PELUM uundertakes with farming communities across Uganda, seed banks, the outcomes that famers experience from adopting agroecological farming practices, and her view of the vit...

Iganachi Razaki Omia is the founder and CEO of Omia Agribusiness Development Group, which provides farmers in northern Uganda with a huge range of sevices from agricultural inputs and extension support services to effective linkages to markets. In this full, unedited interview with Josephine Karungi he talks about how the business started, his personal motivations, and how women and refugees face...

Iganachi Razaki Omia is the founder and CEO of Omia Agribusiness Development Group, which provides farmers in northern Uganda with a huge range of sevices from agricultural inputs and extension support services to effective linkages to markets. He joins Josephine Karungi to talk about how the business started, his personal motivations, and how women and refugees face particular challenges when it...

Looking back on it, 2025 was a big year: we covered climate change, electric boda-bodas and reducing food waste; innovations to improve the shelf life of fruit and increase moisture retention in soil; coffee prices, food prices and how climate change affects them, including at the local market; we've talked mental health, public health more broadly and how AI might be used to predict future needs;...

So much stuff in this episode. Big stuff. Uganda is now co-chairing the Green Climate Fund: 'You can't be the one that is slaughtering a cow and then you don't give your family a big part of that cow.' Then there's the green list, the red list and the blue zone; the promised tripling of adaptation finance and the adaptation plan for Uganda. There's the fossil fuel roadmap that wasn't; a phased app...

Bart Dewaele is a General Director at Join For Water. Recorded on 21st November 2025, while negotiations at COP30 were still underway, he shares his clear-eyed reflections on how things were playing out. Touching on many of the key issues for Uganda including the Global Goals on Adaptation, water, finance and fossil fuels, his insights are thoughtful, articulate and - despite the setbacks - focuse...

The future of the world's freshwater resources in an unpredictably changing climate is a vital issue. Vanessa Thompson, Communication and Development Advisor for Join For Water, Africa, joins us to outline what we might expect from COP30. She also describes the work Join For Water is currently doing in Uganda, and why it matters. You can find out more about the work of Join For Water here: https:/...

As COP30 gets up to speed we're joined by Jackson Muhindo Rukara of OXFAM Uganda. Before he leaves for Belem on Friday 14th he gives us a rundown on the priorities for OXFAM and other African countries. With an over-arching emphasis on payments for loss and damage, he identifies the key objectives that can make this happen. Despite the difficluties, he's excited and optimistic about the possiblity...

The first of a series of special episodes on the UN Conference of Parties in Brazil - COP30 - the world's biggest climate shindig. I mean conference. In this first episode we hear three perspectives on what it's like to go to a COP (70,000+ people went to the one last year in Baku...that's a lot of sandwiches...), what goes on there and why it matters. Dr Francis Mwesigye is a Chief Economist at U...

A conversation about a report from the World Bank might not be your idea of a fun time. But as Cyril Desponts explains, the Uganda Country Climate and Development Report is fascinating, and a significant step on the journey towards a climate resilient future for the country. It's a journey that's already underway and, as this conversation reveals, it touches on every aspect of Ugandan society from...