Through the Food for Peace initiative, the Rotary Club of Makerere Passport is stepping in to provide meals to over 200 students who struggle to afford meals, especially during the examination period.

According to Professor Barnabas Nawangwe, the Vice Chancellor of Makerere University and President of the Rotary Club of Makerere Passport, hundreds of students drop out of Makerere University every year due to financial constraints. The reality for those who remain is sometimes tougher, for they struggle to survive.

While addressing the media at a press conference held at Makerere University on November 11, 2026, Prof. Nawangwe shared that many of these students skip meals, a situation that is more frequent during examination periods, when the demands on the brain are much greater.

The University is aware of these reports and in his capacity as Vice Chancellor and President of the Rotary Club of Makerere Passport, Prof. Nawangwe lobbied the club to take action.

In preparation for intervention, a comprehensive needs assessment was conducted, inviting students to come forward and share their needs. About 200 students responded to the survey, indicating a pressing need for food support during examinations.

The findings birthed a legacy project code-named “Food for Peace”, targeting, for a start, 206 students at Makerere University, regardless of their sponsorship status, as long as they participated in the survey. The Makerere Rotary Peace Centre spearheaded the survey that helped identify the first cohort of those who will benefit from the initiative and guided that for a dignified experience, the beneficially names will remain in records and not disclosed.

Prof. Nawangwe emphasised that the core mission of this cause is to move a step up with efforts to ensure that economically challenged students at Makerere University do not go a day without a meal. Service providers in halls of residence will serve these students their food following a meal card.

Seeding the Project

The Guest of Honour, Mr. Emmanuel Katongole, the Rotary International Director (RID) for Zone 22, while launching the initiative shared his personal experience of facing challenges that almost barred him from attaining an education. He believes education is an equaliser in life and that everyone should have a chance to access it. He reminded those in the room that they were all there together because of education.

RID Katongole highlighted the importance of supporting people, both as individuals and as a community. He expressed pride in being part of the launch of this project because it is going to create many more “Emmanuel Katongoles” through the provision of a meal.

He therefore personally committed to contribute UGX 5 million annually, starting this year, for as long as he lives or until the project ends. He also pledged to remain part of the initiative.

92nd Guild Commends “Service above Self”

From a student perspective, H.E. Kadondi Gracious, the 92^nd Makerere University Guild President, delivered a vote of thanks for the initiative. She noted that students had petitioned Parliament to intervene in the matter and were happy that solutions had started coming from within.

She framed this move not just as charity, but as a way of restoring hope to Makerereans who were unsure of how they were going to maneuver through the examination period without lunch. In appreciation, the Guild President commended Rotary for showing what it actually means to offer service above self.

Sustainability of the “Food for Peace” Project

Although the immediate intervention is directed towards fewer than 300 students who expressed a need for assistance, the vision is bigger and looking beyond the current examination season.

As the Rotary Passport Club President noted, “if this is going to be sustainable, it means we are going to look out for partners to create a fund to sustain this initiative.”

The Club Secretary, Associate Professor Helen Nambalirwa Nkabala, explained that as a legacy project, it is not a one-off. She committed the services of the Passport Club to supporting this legacy project.

Grounding the sustainability move, RID Emmanuel Katongole set the pace by pledging annual cash and in-kind support towards providing consistent assistance to students throughout subsequent academic periods, thereby enhancing student welfare over the long term.

Dr Winfred Kabumbuli, the Makerere University Dean of Students, showed strong support for the initiative since it falls within the core mission of student welfare. She appreciated the collaboration with Makerere University Passport Club, and pledged to rally internal support.

Call to Action and Contributions

The Club President made an appeal to alumni, corporate bodies, development partners, individuals and institutions of goodwill to join this noble cause, intended to ensure that students not only remain at the University but also attain their full potential on a full stomach.

The immediate fundraising goal is UGX 10 million shillings, which is required to implement the initial phase of food support. Excess amounts collected will facilitate an increase in the number of beneficiaries and after the examination period, add to the kitty for subsequent semesters.

Support and assistance can come in the form of financial contributions, food supplies, corporate partnerships, logistical support, and long-term partnerships.

To facilitate support, the club, through its Charter Treasurer (C.T.), Professor Winston Tumps Ireeta, shared the banking details as follows

Students were left with one final promise from the Chief Guest, “you are no longer alone. You have a partner in the Rotary Club of Makerere Passport.”

This week, world leaders, negotiators and researchers are gathered in Antalya, Türkiye, for COP31, the United Nations climate conference, seeking to turn years of climate commitments into action countries can finance and implement. Among them is Dr. John Bosco Isunju, a climate and health researcher at Makerere University School of Public Health, named among TIME’s 100 most influential climate leaders in 2024.

Dr. Isunju led the School’s technical support to the Ministry of Health for Uganda’s 2023 Climate Change Health Vulnerability and Adaptation Assessment (VAA) and the subsequent development of the Health National Adaptation Plan (H-NAP) 2025–2030. The assessment covered 716 health facilities across 43 districts, documenting vulnerabilities that helped shape the country’s priorities for protecting healthcare from climate hazards.

That experience speaks directly to the task before the 9–20 November summit. With “Dynamic and Resilient Health Systems” among the COP31 Presidency’s Action Agenda priorities, the conference is seeking practical solutions and financing to keep services functioning through climate shocks. Adaptation, the practical changes needed to cope with a changing climate, must ultimately reach the facilities where people seek care.

Protecting facilities from floods and drought also safeguards the public investment behind them, giving Uganda’s adaptation effort an economic significance alongside its importance to patients. In a 27 October 2026 statement ahead of COP31, UN Climate Change Executive Secretary Simon Stiell placed climate action within that wider calculation of public benefit.

“More governments are taking climate action right across their economies, to bank the vast benefits of clean energy and climate resilience,” he said. “Almost every major economy, and many medium-sized and smaller economies, now see climate action as a central driver of economic growth, jobs, and affordable and secure energy.”

On 21 October, nearly three weeks before the Antalya talks, the H-NAP was before Ugandan parliamentarians in Kampala. Convened by the Ministry of Health and Parliamentary Forum on Climate Change Uganda, with support from Regenerate Africa and the Clinton Health Access Initiative, the engagement examined the plan and Parliament’s role in securing funding, scrutinising implementation and ensuring accountability.

Presenting the VAA, Dr. Isunju explained that the team examined the hazards facing each area, the extent of exposure and the weaknesses that made services vulnerable. They also considered the communities the facilities served. A flood could turn an already difficult journey to treatment into one that patients and staff could no longer make, as seen in many parts of Uganda, including Kasese.

“Either health workers will not work, or communities will not be able to access care, or outreaches will not be possible because roads are cut off,” he told legislators.

Uganda’s H-NAP grew out of commitments made at COP26 in Glasgow in 2021 to assess health vulnerabilities and develop an adaptation response. The Ministry of Health commissioned the School to undertake the VAA in 2023, with Rockefeller Foundation funding supporting both the assessment and the plan’s development. Developed through stakeholder consultation, with WHO technical support and contributions from other partners, the plan was launched on 22 August 2024.

What the assessment found

The VAA found that drought and floods were disrupting the conditions needed to deliver care. Nearly half of the assessed facilities reported drought exposure, while about two in five reported floods. Among the 284 facilities reporting flood exposure, 141 (about half) said health professionals had been unable to arrive at or leave their workplaces, and 198 (about seven in ten) reported shortages of safe water. Because districts were selected for their history of hazards, these findings describe the assessed facilities and cannot be treated as national estimates.

The H-NAP responds across ten components of the health system, including leadership, workforce training, risk monitoring and sustainable financing. Its proposed actions include revising infrastructure standards and using weather and disease information to warn of health risks earlier. Protecting care requires investment in buildings alongside the people and systems that make them function.

“A significant proportion of healthcare facilities lack water management and safety plans to address contamination risks,” the H-NAP states. “They lack water safety plans and contingency plans for monitoring and reducing contaminants as well as on-site water purification equipment.” Such gaps can leave facilities unable to maintain hygiene, clean equipment and provide treatment safely when water supplies fail or become contaminated.

The H-NAP already includes a budget, giving implementation a basis for resource mobilisation. The UN climate secretariat’s 2026 report on national adaptation plans across sectors identifies the difficulty of turning priorities into fundable projects. It recommends costing specific interventions and securing delivery partners, steps that can help advance Uganda’s health adaptation priorities.

At household level, climate pressures on livelihoods can leave families less able to get care or keep children in school, as community consultations showed.

“Their problems are interconnected. If climate, for example, affects their livelihoods, it directly impacts their health, because that means when they fall sick they can’t get care, and they can’t take their children to school, so things are all interconnected,” Dr. Isunju said.

The Ministry’s Focal Point for Climate Change and Health, Dr. Didacus Namanya, told MPs that resilience, the ability to withstand disruption and keep providing care, must inform how services are built and managed.

“So, our vision in the H-NAP is to have a responsive, adaptive, and resilient health system. Adaptive, we are talking about adaptation. These impacts will not stop; they will continue coming, but we must develop our adaptive capacity. The way we build our health facilities, the way we tackle the disease burden, we must be highly adaptive,” he said.

Dr. Namanya called for district-specific assessments, noting the different conditions in Nakasongola and Bududa, and described an ongoing review of infrastructure design standards. Dr. Isunju reported that guidelines for coordinating climate and health action across institutions were undergoing approval.

A partnership announced in October 2025 by the Rockefeller Foundation and the International Development Research Centre is helping the School and the Clinton Health Access Initiative, working with the Ministry of Health, build an investment case for H-NAP implementation. A separate Ministry of Health and Global Green Growth Institute initiative, begun in June 2026, is advancing climate-resilient water, sanitation and hygiene standards, investment plans for health facilities and the government’s capacity to deliver improvements.

Questions for Antalya

Legislators sought evidence of what implementation had delivered. Terego East MP Hon. Wilfred Babanga Erima asked how much of the plan had been implemented, how many facilities had been audited and refitted for climate resilience, and how funding was divided between domestic and donor sources. Hon. Shafiga Wanyenya, Vice Chairperson of Parliament’s Committee on Climate Change, proposed joint follow-up with the health committee and regular progress reviews.

“Our role is to ask the difficult questions and also identify implementation gaps, to advocate for the vulnerable communities and ensure that the national commitments translate into tangible improvements in the lives of our people,” Hon. Wanyenya said.

Those questions belong in Antalya too. The Yearbook of Global Climate Action 2026 identifies gaps in global data for assessing whether health systems are becoming more resilient, underlining the importance of tracking what adaptation efforts deliver for health.

The COP31 health programme links implementation of the Belém Health Action Plan with a financing framework intended to help turn health priorities into investable projects. Launched on 9 November, the Antalya Initiative for Health Resilience provides a platform for countries to share practical experience. The COP28 adaptation framework sets targets for climate-resilient health services by 2030 and progressively beyond, alongside national adaptation planning by 2030 and multi-hazard early-warning systems by 2027.

The H-NAP gives Uganda a practical agenda for that next stage. It calls for climate and health priorities to enter government budgets and for proposals capable of attracting finance. It also identifies academic partnerships as a route to research and capacity-building funds. Annual reviews would then assess progress and guide subsequent work.

As negotiations continue in Antalya, the next test is whether decisions there, and action at home, help keep care available, on the road to a health facility, and at the water point on which safe treatment depends.

View on MakSPH

The Research and Education Network for Uganda (RENU) Graduate Trainee Program in Communications offers an opportunity to gain practical experience in content development, digital marketing, public relations and multimedia production.

Trainees will work alongside experienced professionals to develop engaging content, support communication campaigns and contribute to initiatives that showcase the impact of research and education in Uganda.

Application Deadline: Monday 16^th November 2026 at 5:00 PM Uganda time.

Only shortlisted candidates will be contacted.

Submit application to: https://jobs.renu.ac.ug

Note: Females are strongly encouraged to apply.