KAMPALA – PostBank Uganda, a government financial institution has increased its funding to the Federation for Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (FSME) towards value addition and financial literacy training for SMEs from Shs80 million to Shs200 million.
In 2022, the bank announced its flagship of “Yongela Ko Omutindo” (value addition), under Corporate and Social Responsibility – CSR activity aimed at equipping SMEs countrywide with value addition and financial literacy skills.
John Walugembe, the Executive Director, FSME told the press on Wednesday that a total of 500 Small and Medium Enterprises were equipped with skills in agricultural value addition and financial literacy and they have since transformed their businesses to formal.
In the first cohort, Walugembe noted that they trained SMEs from selected regions of Arua, Lira, Mbarara and Kampala, particularly in agricultural products.
“As you know, agriculture is the backbone of Uganda and in line with the government’s approach to ensuring businesses add value, the 39% of Ugandans tapped in abject poverty are able to rise and take part in the market economy.”
“We developed a manual that is aligned with the National Financial Literacy Strategy. We also proceeded to partner with different agencies including the National Bureau of Standards. For instance, we trained SMEs in Mbarara on adding value to milk and creating different products like yoghurt. We worked with SMEs here in Kampala to add value to fresh fruits and vegetables and they were able to make tomato sauce and juices…” said Walugembe.
This year, he noted that they are continuing with the same campaign.
“We are going to have trainings in Soroti where we are going to support SMEs to add value to millet, Koboko, to add value to cassava. So we are identifying specific value chains in specific regions and our support is tailored to supporting SMEs in those areas.”
According to Walugembe, they have doubled the number of SMEs that will attend the training.
“Previously there were 20 per technical training, and then we had more attending the financial literacy training.”
He noted that they want to see beneficiaries being part of the formal system, and part of their training is to support them on the road to formality through registering, opening a bank account, and ensuring that their products meet the standards.
Also, Walugembe said they are going to trace the previous trainees to see what additional support they can provide.
Mr. Ssenyange Peter – PostBank Chief Finance Officer said that their CSR programme has four pillars; health, education and sports, environment, and financial literacy and skills where SMEs fall.
For, one to qualify, he said one must be already doing something that needs to be promoted and formalized
“The government’s drive and our drive is to make sure that whatever we do, has value addition. That’s the only way the beneficiaries can improve their livelihood.”
“Because of the overwhelming success of the previous programme, we’re moving it from Shs80 million to Shs200 million.”
As a bank, Senyange says they have over 100,000 smallholder farmers all engaged in various levels of production, but it stops at the production level.
“Not many of the things we produce as a country have any value added to them. So the prices that are our business people, our smallholder farmers, our small and medium-sized enterprise earn are low.”
With this programme, he said beneficiaries are able to enhance their skills and grow their businesses exponentially.
