Crowdfunding for Volunteering Trip to The University of Makerere

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Our Story

Uganda has an abundance of natural resources. It is amazingly fertile, producing sugar cane, tea, coffee and many other crops. It possesses reserves of copper, oil and uranium. Despite this, it is one of the poorest countries in the world with much of the exploitation by foreign developers with minimum regard to the environmental consequences and safety of employees. We aim to support the training and education of Ugandans in both modern, green technology and in rigorous health and safety procedures, so they can run their own industries safely, increasing local wealth and employment prospects, all done with improved care for the environment.

We have initiated a collaboration with the University of Makerere in Uganda, so Makerere can become a hub of excellence in sub-Saharan Africa. We will hold free, regular training workshops for participants from universities in sub-Saharan Africa and local industries. In these workshops, the participants will get hands-on practice with the latest design software, the necessary tool to create the most efficient, low-carbon, low-emissions processes possible. We will share good practice, particularly in worker health and safety and in green technology. We piloted this collaboration last year, with two students going to Makerere to instigate the bond between our universities and begin the journey of developing these skills within this Ugandan community.

This summer we will run our first training workshop. Manchester University will contribute £3,000 so that one staff member and two students can travel to Makerere. For real impact, though, we need more students and staff from Manchester and we also need funding to support the attendance of African participants. Much of the activity will be hands-on training with design software on computer clusters. Manchester students are already familiar with this software, having used it themselves to design chemical processes. Their role is to provide individual support to the participants, helping them overcome both programming and engineering obstacles. They will also play the invaluable role of interacting socially with their African peers, comparing and contrasting their academic training and broadening their experience of how other countries do things.

More staff are need to broaden the topics that need addressing. For example, oil and gas processes and vastly different from those needed to make beer or pharmaceuticals! We need staff with expertise in different area. Finally, and very importantly, we want engineers with UK industrial experience to participate. We trust that many of our alumni and industrial colleagues will join us in Makerere to share their practical, industrial experience.