The Busoga Consortium for Development (BCD), a regional development framework in the Busoga subregion, remains determined to steer local economic transformation of the region to middle economic status during the next ten years of 2020/21 to 2030/31.
Operationalizing the Busoga development agenda with its leading pillar of commercialisation of agriculture, BCD intends to introduce and umpack the Village Development Model (VDM), an initiative designed as a sustainable and integrated community methodology. The proactive programme aims at fostering agricultural productivity, economic growth, environmental stewardship, and social wellbeing within a localised setting.
VAM, which reinforces the drive of government of Uganda to transform communities through the Parish Development Model (PDM), follows a signing of a memorandum of understanding between BCD and the College of International Development and Globe Agriculture (CIDGA), an institution visioned to promote development related research, dialogue, capacity building and demonstration practice with a special focus on agriculture and poverty reduction.
Twelve VAM villages across the twelve local governments of Busoga will be established as a pilot for the VAM strategy, serving as examples for sustainable development. These villages will integrate innovative approaches on agriculture with a focus on intercropping maize, cassava, soybeans, simsim, and beans to diversify agricultural products.
The model emphasises holistic development, merging traditional farming practices with modern innovations to create a thriving, self-sufficient, and resilient villages.
Simple and effective model, proven both in the Philippines and the Western China, VAM stands as a beacon of hope for rural communities worldwide, offering a holistic approach to agricultural development which goes beyond mere production to address the broader challenges of food security, poverty reduction and environmental sustainability. It is also distinctive in its ability to bridge the communication and information gap between the masses of peasant farmers, research institutes, and the local government.
For effective implementation of the initiative, VAM emphasises community engagement and mindset change with the active involvement of local communities in decision-making processes, project implementation, and resource management. Holistic agricultural development, capacity building and skill enhancement, market access and value chain development, and infrastructure and service provision are some of the pillars of the model.
The long-term impact of VAM is to improve the lives of farmers living in environmentally degraded environments through the widespread adoption of sustainable agriculture techniques and other capacity building activities at the community levels. VAM envisions the successful implementation of a low-cost community development model that can easily be replicated in the other areas of the country to reach millions of peasant farmers who desire to improve the quality of their lives.
The model was proposed for implementation because it is locally adoptable and based on the transfer of sustainable agriculture techniques to whole communities. As the benefits of sustainable community development are realised, the people will have greater household self-reliance through increased income and opportunities.
