Our Programme

UCAA’s overall strategic goal is that impoverished rural communities are empowered to participate in the decision-making and livelihood enhancement for sustainable development. With support from its partners and other stakeholders, UCAA work for the following changes. Rural communities and change agent members, including other stakeholders meaningfully engaged in local and national decision-making processes and structures and have positively influenced outcomes.

An empowered and self-reliant citizenry able to realize and achieve their aspirations and dreams in a sustainable way.Institutions, structures, norms and barriers that reinforce impoverishment and marginalization are challenged and reformed so that impoverished rural communities can have access to information and influence decision-making processes, and can hold governments accountable for equitable development. Dialogue and constructive engagement between conflicting groups and conflict transformation as a means of resolving violence and conflict to enhance reconciliation and harmonious living.

UCAA’s strategic entry points

1. UCAA has trained change Agents all over the country with well-established structures (branches and district change agent associations, regional and national).
2. Change Agents’ rural groups of women and men.
3. UCAA has developed clear links between political governance and economic governance work, particularly around the equitable use of national resources for poverty reduction.
4. UCAA uses international human rights standards as a platform for facilitating increased advocacy and networking with government and other partners.

Change Agent self-reliant participatory development training:

UCAA developed and applied the Concept of Change Agent self-reliant participatory development methodology (SRPD) as a tool for developing critical awareness of rural men and women social reality to ensure that self-reliant participatory development processes at community level is enhanced. The methodology has been widely and extensively used to implement its activities in the rural communities through training of Change Agents.

The Change Agent Training model is premised on the ideals that, if poor rural men and women become conscientised (consciously awakened) to analyse the root causes of their poverty, then they can find solutions to remedy that poverty by adopting the various measures of the training. Building upon the principles of adult education and experiential participatory learning processes in which empowerment and conscientisation (change agent philosophy) is anchored on, the methodology has proven very effective and has grown into an institutional flagship product which has been in high demand among rural community groups, CSOs and the district local government, especially where UCAA had an effect. The training consists of various topics like development theory, poverty analysis, working with groups, income generating activities book keeping, entrepreneurship, Business skills development, Improved agricultural practices, gender and culture, VSLA methodology, enterprise selection, vocational skills, positive parenting and advocacy etc.