Guest author: Rejoice Africa Foundation

Who is Rejoice Africa Foundation? Rejoice Africa foundation is nonprofit charitable organization founded by indigenous people from the republic of Uganda with the same vision, mission and objectives in line saving the next generation. [Rejoice Africa Foundation replaces Kibengo Youths Care Activists]

Vision                                                                   

To strengthen the capacity of grassroots communities in preventing and alleviating climate risks and ensure that no life is jeopardized due to climate change impacts.

Mission

Building resilience against climate change in Uganda.

Objectives

Identifying multifaceted responses to conserve the environment, ecosystem and mitigate climate changes in Uganda.

To promote sanitation and hygiene for grassroots communities through establishing to improve air and water quality and reduce water bone diseases and ensure that there’s shelter and sufficient food.

Collaborate and involve grassroots communities to find and implement solutions to avert climate change induced poverty in youth.

Rejoice Africa foundation founding members based the entity on the following challenges facing today’s generations.

1. Over population in Africa.
2. Increased carbon emission and greenhouse gases (harsh climate change)
3. Poor sanitation and hygiene.
4. Poverty rates in Africa.
5. Plastic pollution.
6. Extinction of wildlife.

Overpopulation in Africa. In 1990, as the human global population reached 5,327,231,061. then in 2021 human global population reached 7. 9 billion people on global total land area of 13,003 million hectares. Rejoice Africa foundation predicts in 2100 the global human population will be 9,735,033,900 people on the planet earth. These will increase demand for food, water, housing, health, transportation energy, unemployment, instabilities and environmental degradation. 

Please see an analysis Rejoice recently completed regarding population growth in Africa.

Rejoice Africa foundation is hereby suggesting the following strategies in human overpopulation on the limited global land area of 13,003 million hectares,

1. Giving reproductive health education through secondary school for all with a particular focus on girls. as an important tool of empowerment, education can potentially provide young people with control over fertility especially among girls. COVID-19 has increased girls’ exposure to unwanted pregnancies due to limited access to birth control facilities in the health centers. In order to meet this strategy, RAF aims at promoting reproductive health education for all girls through peer-to-peer reproductive health education in identified secondary schools, avail learning materials of ways to control unwanted pregnancies.
2. Assure universal access to a range of safe and effective contraceptive options for both sexes;

90 % of Contraceptives methods have been for only one sex (girls) and the have many side effects affects the girls/women leading to fear of acquiring contraceptives leading to lack of birth control. male sex contributes to population increase because one man can in pregnant 4 women daily if they are in fertile days whereas women can be fertile for only 7 days in the months and a pregnancy takes 9 months.  Rejoice Africa Foundation is calling for universal access fewer side effects contraceptives to all sexes (unisex contraceptive methods)

3. End all policies that reward parents financially based on the number of children. Some countries support poor families with funds basing on size of the family members, these families tend to produce many children for targeting large family members that can attract governments to support them with a lot of funds. There is need for government policy makers to revisit and amend those policies for people to control birth rates.
4. Convince leaders to commit to ending population growth through the exercise of human rights and human development. Through coalitions with other organizations, foundations, Rejoice Africa foundation is calling stakeholders.
5. Menstrual hygiene for all girls/women of childbearing age.  most girls in developing world have faced poor menstruation care due to inadequate access to safe water and sanitary pads. Rejoice Africa foundation emerged to improve on water accessibility to all identified vulnerable girls in Uganda.
6. Religious beliefs: some religion in today’s generation they oppose birth control methods they end up promoting population increase.

Rejoice and Fair Start working together

Rejoice leadership and Fair Start have both urged the United Nations, Partners in Population Development and other world leaders to adopt Fair Start or comparable family reforms, and mutually support calls for climate reparations based on correcting the baseline error that underlies current and near universal family planning systems, the error that is fundamentally driving climate change and massive economic inequity.

 Poor sanitation and hygiene and end plastic pollution

Plastic pollution is a fact and it’s widely acknowledged that world is midst of climate crisis.

Human activities such as use of non-biodegradable plastic materials have increased extinction of water animals, water volumes and land degradation.

In Uganda, plastic use such as form of drinking water and sodas have discharged 600 metric tons of plastic waste per day only 6% of plastic wastes are collected.

The remaining 94% of plastic wastes are not collected.

Indigenous people are not well versed with the innovation of reusing 94% of uncollectible plastics. These uncollectible plastics washed away by running water into water sources (lakes, wells, springs, Rivers and pods) and other can be covered by the soil.

Non-biodegradable plastic materials take many years to decay. High amounts of plastic wastes accumulated in water sources have resulted into reduced water volume for human consumption hence reducing rainfall cycle in the region.

Most schoolgirls who are undergoing menstruation period are directly affected because of inadequate access to clean water for hygiene and drinking.

They have suffered unhygienic menstruation management that increased fungal and bacterial infection leading to psychosocial stress in girls hence not learning well in class.

The country ends up having more school dropouts.

Re-using plastic bottles to construct rainwater reservoir tanks in schools has emerged as a major instrument to fight plastic pollutions and inadequate access to clean water supply to schoolgirls in Uganda.

It’s one of the numbers of innovative strategies targeted at reducing 94%of uncollected plastic bottles in the communities.

Improving accessibility of adequate water sources in schools will reduce school dropouts related to Psychosocial stress in schoolgirls.

Increased carbon emission and greenhouse gases

Enhancing Agroforestry/permaculture for Promotion of Climate Change Resilience, Eco social and rural livelihoods in Uganda.

Climate change is a fact, and it is widely acknowledged that the world is in the midst of a global warming Crisis. Human activities such as fossil fuel combustion and land use change have released greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, which is the primary driver of recent climate change. Land use such as Agriculture alone, discharges more than 6 billion metric tons of greenhouse gases (GHG) into the atmosphere each year. Because of increased severity of climate change impacts on some Areas, the consequences have been more severe and disastrous.

In Uganda, climate change is a serious problem, affecting livelihoods. The country experiences prolonged drought, short and erratic rains which are disastrous and affecting Agriculture production, the backbone of the country.

Also due to disparities in traditional roles, societal expectations and livelihoods, men and women are affected differently by climate changes.

Women account for the bulk of Uganda’s Population of 23.19 million population.

They have lower wages, less access to credit, decision – making power and less control over resources all of which make them more vulnerable to climate changes.

It’s therefore important to consider differences when tackling the issue of climate change.

Agroforestry/ permaculture has emerged as a major instrument in the fight against climate change in recent years.  It’s a widely accepted answer to the twin problems of climate change and food security.

It’s one of a number of innovative strategies targeted at increasing production while also assisting in the mitigation of climate change by increasing carbon sequestration and boosting the system’s ability to cope with negative consequences of climate change mitigation and development of vulnerable group’s livelihoods such as women, by planting fruit trees alongside food crops.

TAKE ACTION: URGE THE UNFOA TO ADDOPT FAIR START REFORMS NOW.