“People are looking at it [volunteering] as an opportunity to gain experience, an opportunity to earn income, an opportunity to get even skills, training. […] The youth who are unemployed are ones who are mainly targeted by these volunteer schemes and the main objective ideally would really be to empower them, help them improve on their skills so that they can be deployed later on when there are opportunities for them to access wage payment services. So… I really look at it as another form of employment for the youth.”
(Interview, Government Official, Kampala)
“Youth-friendly sustainable career”
There is some sign of skill acquisition of where voluntary work by the youth especially this girl; she was trying to practice how to plait hair in the saloon. Plaiting hair is something voluntary, you do it from your own heart.
Photo by Wilfred Mukulia (Bidibidi)
“Refugee youth can succeed starting with small things”
“…the volunteering that I did back in Somalia was not a big deal like it is here in Uganda. In my home country, volunteering was not seen as something so useful but here it is really useful and even as a way of living.” - Male refugee (Nakivale)
Photo by Esther Musafiri (Kampala)
“Volunteering has earned me a paid job”
They are at the distribution point where the volunteers are there, and the staff are there. The volunteers are trying to pull those tents out; they're trying to help.
Photo by Kennedy Abonga (Bidibidi)