Privatization of Land and its Impacts on Agro-Pastoral Livelihoods in Karamoja, Uganda: Case studies of Moroto and Nakapiripirit Districts

KRSU Publication

Privatization of Land and its Impacts on Agro-Pastoral Livelihoods in Karamoja, Uganda: Case studies of Moroto and Nakapiripirit Districts

September 2024
By: Raphael Lotira Arasio, Michael Odhiambo

This report presents the findings of a review of land issues in Karamoja, with a particular focus on trends in privatization of communal lands and its impacts on agro-pastoral livelihoods.

KRSU Publication

Localized Approaches to Measuring Localization

September 2024

In November 2021 United States Agency for International Development (USAID) announced a new global localization agenda that aims to shift more funding and decision-making to local organizations and groups. Under this agenda, USAID positioned local leadership over development and humanitarian assistance as important for aid effectiveness, equity, and sustainability.

KRSU Publication

Guidelines for Participatory Water Management and Development in Karamoja

August 2024
By: Raphael Lotira Arasio, Adrian Cullis

Water resources support key sectors of the economy namely: hydropower generation, agriculture, fisheries, domestic water supply, industry and navigation among others. However, the efficiency and sustainability of water utilization has recently been a concern in Uganda mainly due to inadequate sectoral collaboration in planning and implementation, increasing frequency of floods and droughts, environmental degradation and pollution of water resources.

KRSU Publication

Localized Water and Rangeland Management in Karamoja: Lessons from a participatory review

April 2024

Water and rangeland resources are the basis for livestock production in pastoralist areas of Africa and therefore have major impacts on pastoral livelihoods. Households with insufficient access to water or productive rangeland experience suboptimal herd growth and production, with associated negative impacts on the income and nutritious foods that livestock provide. In common with other African pastoralist and agropastoralist areas,

KRSU Publication

Early Warning and Disaster Response in Karamoja: The need to integrate local knowledge and formal systems

April 2024

A genuine localized approach to early warning should shift the approach to more of a partnership and coacceptance of the strengths and weaknesses of indigenous and conventional systems.

KRSU Publication

KARAMOJA RESILIENCE SUPPORT UNIT: Turning Evidence Into Action

March 2024
By: Chantelle Pattemore, Pius Sawa, Justin Yarga

To gauge understanding of how KRSU’s work benefits and is utilized in Karamoja, a rapid review was conducted in November and December 2023. The review involved face-to-face interviews with a number of the organization’s partners – including non-governmental organizations (NGOs), universities, academics, and donors.

KRSU Publication

Analysis of Educational Approaches in Karamoja

February 2024
By: Elizabeth Stites

This analysis is motivated by the concerns of international donors and other stakeholders regarding the persistent challenges in advancing educational outcomes for the majority of the population in the Karamoja sub-region of Uganda. Substantial improvements in enrolment and retention rates in Karamoja have occurred over the past eight years, but these remain significantly behind the national average, and drop-out rates after primary school are extremely high, especially for female students.i This analysis uses existing primary and secondary data to investigate various approaches for education in the sub-region.

KRSU Publication

WATER AND RANGELAND IN KARAMOJA

August 2023
By: Anthony Egeru, Simon Peter Longoli, Raphael Lotira

Water and rangeland resources are the basis for livestock production in pastoralist areas of Africa and therefore have major impacts on pastoral livelihoods. Households with insufficient access to water or productive rangeland experience suboptimal herd growth and production, with associated negative impacts on the income and nutritious foods that livestock provide.

KRSU Publication

INDIGENOUS EARLY WARNING IN KARAMOJA, UGANDA

March 2023
By: Oliver V. Wasonga, Raphael Lotira

An effective early warning system (EWS) is a prerequisite for timely response to avert and mitigate the impacts of disasters that affect pastoralist and agro-pastoralist communities. Whereas there exist various forms of EWS in Uganda, the main concerns have been whether the early warning information is timely, accurate, accessible, and elicits early action. These questions point at inefficiencies in the conventional EWS in the country and the importance of the indigenous early warning system (IEWS) used by rural communities. These indigenous systems are especially important where conventional early warning information is inaccessible or coarse and therefore not suitable for guiding location-specific decisions.

KRSU Publication

The 2022 Humanitarian Crisis in Karamoja: Findings from a real-time review

November 2022

In July 2022 the Ugandan media reported that 900 people had died of hunger or hunger-related diseases in the Karamoja sub-region since February 2022, and that 8 out of 10 households had limited or no food.i

KRSU Publication

The 2022 Humanitarian Crisis in Karamoja, Uganda: A real-time review

November 2022
By: Raphael Lotira Arasio, Adrian Cullis

This real-time review aims to document the events that led to Karamoja’s hunger crisis in 2022, the reporting of the worsening situation by early warning systems, and the responses of the Government of Uganda and the international aid community. The review took place from the September 27–October 21, 2022.

KRSU Publication

The Return of Conflict in Karamoja, Uganda: Community Perspectives

October 2022
By: Raphael Lotira, Elizabeth Stites

After nearly 10 years of relative peace, conflict and insecurity returned to the Karamoja sub-region of northeastern Uganda starting in 2019. This assessment investigates this resumption of conflict and insecurity from the perspective of the communities most involved and affected.

KRSU Publication

Conflict in Karamoja: A Synthesis of Historical and Current Perspectives, 1920-2022

October 2022
By: Elizabeth Stites

This knowledge synthesis focuses on violent conflict in the Karamoja sub-region of northeastern Uganda. While violence and conflict both can and do take many forms, this synthesis takes as its focus the phenomenon of cattle raiding and associated violence. This knowledge synthesis briefly describes the concept and role of cattle raiding within pastoral societies in East Africa and the Karamoja Cluster and then examines different historical periods and experiences of violent conflict associated with cattle raiding within the Karamoja sub-region.

KRSU Publication

Education in East Africa’s Pastoralist Areas: Why are girls still not going to school?

September 2022

This briefing paper presents learnings from global, and specifically East African, experience to support concerned stakeholders in thinking transformatively about education inclusion in Karamoja. While Karamoja is also home to agriculturalists, this paper focuses specifically on education among those pursuing livelihoods as pastoralists and agro-pastoralists, and particularly on the education of girls in those communities.

KRSU Publication

Educating Girls in Karamoja, Uganda: Barriers, Benefits, and Terms of Inclusion in the Perspectives of Girls, their Communities, and their Teachers

September 2022
By: Barbara Athieno, Caroline Dyer, Elizabeth Stites

This scoping report investigates barriers, benefits, and “terms of inclusion” for girls’ education in the Karamoja sub-region of Uganda. Karamoja has some of the lowest education indicators in the country, with females generally faring much worse than males. The report examines the experiences and perceptions of girls, male and female community members, and teachers about girls’ education in the region, drawing on an assessment that took place from June to August 2022 in 10 sites in four districts: Amudat, Kaabong, Moroto, and Napak.

Karamoja Donor Mapping Report

September 2022

This report summarizes planned humanitarian and development activities of major donors in the Karamoja sub-region

KRSU Publication

Food Security, Nutrition, and Conflict Assessment in Karamoja, Uganda

August 2022
By: Raphael Lotira, Mesfin Ayele

In mid-2020, the Karamoja Resilience Support Unit (KRSU) conducted a rapid assessment that described the impact of COVID-19 containment measures on rural livelihoods in Karamoja (Arasio et al. 20201). The assessment also forecast how disease restrictions would affect livelihoods over the following six to eight months (into early 2021). The initial assessment examined household wellbeing during COVID-19 relative to a normal (good) and bad (drought) year in Karamoja’s three main livelihood zones, represented by Amudat District (predominantly pastoralist but with some emerging crop production), Moroto District (predominantly agropastoralist), and Abim District (with high dependence on crop production, but also using livestock).