The EfD-Mak Centre has gone into  a three day strategic plan retreat (February 15^th -18^th 2022) to write the strategic plan  for the next five years to ensure that there is proper environmental management in Uganda.

Officials from the Government Ministries, Departments and Agencies, environmental economists from Makerere University colleges of Business and Management Sciences (CoBAMS) and that of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences (CAES), selected officials  from the Makerere University Planning Directorate, representatives from  Civil Society Organisations and the Private sector will participate.

The meeting was officially opened by the Principal, College of Business and Management Sciences Assoc. Prof. Eria Hisali at Ridar Hotel in Seeta.

The EfD-Mak-Centre was established in 2018 at the EfD Global Hub’s annual meeting in Hanoi, Vietnam and is among the newly established Centres making up 15 centres of the EfD Global network.

The Centre was launched at Makerere University on 29^th August, 2019 under the joint management the CoBAMS, and CAES. It is mandated to build capacity in environmental economics through capacity building and sponsoring action-oriented research projects to find solutions to the most pressing environmental and development challenges such as climate change for sustainable development.

While opening the meeting, the Principal CoBAMS congratulated the centre leadership upon achievements so far recorded noting that since its inception, it has remain on course and continued to do a commendable job.

Assoc. Prof. Hisali said, the work that the centre is set out to do is central to the future of not only Uganda, but also, the future of humanity.

“There is very little that we are going to be able to do going forward without harnessing and learning how to co-exist with the different aspects of the environment and this is something that we better take very seriously, otherwise, the growth and prosperity that we see today across the globe will be very quickly wiped away without taking due consideration to environmental concerns.” he said.

Assoc. Prof. Hisali congratulated the EfD-Mak centre leadership for  mobilizing the team and coming  gather to discuss raising key issues of interest to the participants in the course of the discussion for the strategic plan .

He implored participants to consider the issue of  visualization of  the centre taking care of whether they need to expand the institutional capacity in terms of administrative structure, how the structure should look like and how to align the activities of the centre into the mainstream activities of the university.

“Are we going to remain focused on research, training and outreach or there is a possibility of doing a few other things that would be part of the visualization that we need to take into consideration as we develop the strategic plan.

Once we finish the visualization, the next thing is the outlook, how to operationalize it, steps and resources that are required for the next five years”, The Principal advised.

Hisali also implored participants to appreciate in greater detail what the status quo currently is, the gaps there between and the implementation plan itself, noting that the strategic plan is just part of the process.

“There will be an annex called  implementation matrix and in doing this, you benefit from experience, what you know, but avoid as much as  possible putting in things that are clearly not achievable because you are going to be evaluated on the basis of what you have put down.

But good reporting also now entails capturing other things and achievements that you did that are outside the plan. So you should not constrain yourself to including everything in the plan, and  also hope that at some stage we would be able to cost what  we are think about so that we get a sense of what is possible and what it might take to deliver this plan,” the Principal advised.

The other important consideration according to Prof. Hisali was the alignment of the mandate of the centre with the interventions and objectives so that they speak to the input indicators and outputs which must come from the conceptualization.

The Director EfD-Mak Centre Prof. Edward Bbaale noted that although natural resources constitute the primary source of livelihood for the majority of the people in Uganda, they have come under increased pressure arising from high population growth rates with its associated high poverty levels, limited public knowledge on environmental functions, and poor governance.

“Due to high poverty levels, many people are still engaged in charcoal burning, hunting, and farming in environmentally risky areas like wetlands. As a consequence, many forests, wetlands and their associated biodiversity have been heavily destroyed.” the Director noted.

The Director pointed out that, Uganda’s natural resources and environmental challenges pose serious threats to realizing the country’s sustainable development agenda and therefore, the establishment of the EfD-Mak Centre is timely and provides an opportunity to work on practical solutions to reverse the current trends.

Together with the relevant stakeholders, Prof. Bbaale said, the Centre is committed to provide the much-needed evidence, capacity development, policy outreaches and advocacy.

Bbaale said the strategic plan will focus on capacity development in managing Uganda’s natural capital to the relevant officials and practitioners, and will strive to ensure demand driven trainings that serve the real purpose.

In addition, the professor said, the strategic plan seeks to address the existing governance and institutional gaps in managing environment and natural resources in Uganda and the persistent disaggregation of empirical research and policy engagement.

“The Centre is currently priding in an experienced mass of Research Fellows at all levels with diverse research interest from energy, transport, agriculture, climate change, forestry, wildlife and others. These together with the support from the global hub and partners are strong to bridge the research-policy gap.

 Currently, the Centre is running a number of research projects with support from the global hub and this is evidence that the Centre is set and ready to face and address the above challenges together with partners.”, Prof. Bbaale asserted.

The Director also reported that since its launch, the Centre has grown its wings away from being typical Makerere-based and created partnerships with some District Local governments and some Universities with regional coordinators for the both local governments and Universities. With these strategic partnerships, Bbaale said the Centre will strengthen the policy engagements with stakeholders not only at the centre, but also across the country. This will be good for the research disseminations and policy engagements on environment and natural resources.

Prof. Bbaale further said, the Centre has also created functional working relationships with a number of government ministries and agencies, the civil society, private sector, international agencies and academia. These strategic working relations according the Director will position the Centre to spearhead policy discussions in the space of Environment and natural resources and inclusive green economy with the ability of uptake of the resolutions.

The Centre according to the Director is having strategic working relations with sister EfD-Centres in the region including EfD-Tanzania and EfD-Kenya. This he said, is very crucial in conducting joint research activities that yield policy discussions that benefit the entire region thereby contributing to the East African Community Policy Agenda on environment and climate change for the EAC Vision 2050.

Prof. Bbaale also reported that the Centre is establishing the Advisory Board which will provide the strategic direction and guidance to the centre. This he said, is very critical in realizing the strategic objectives of the Centre as highlighted in the strategic plan and the annual plans.

Jane Anyango is the Communication Officer, EfD-Mak Centre Uganda.