Benaaps Goats Farm. Photo by Ivan Tolit.
In Atiak Sub-County, northern Uganda, the climate is changing faster than expected. Rainfall has become less predictable for farmers in households without irrigation technologies to grow adequate food all year round.
Longer dry spells and extreme weather are making farming more difficult for many families there. Yet amid these challenges, one animal is helping households adapt and build resilience—rearing hybrid goats.
“The seasonal rainfall pattern here is no longer the same as what our forefathers knew. Sometimes we plant our crops expecting rain, but it doesn’t come or appears too late for timely planting. Other times, the rains are too heavy and destroy our crops with waterlogging or floods,” says Charles Ayella, the chairperson of Benaaps Business Solution Limited, said during a recent interview.
War-Driven Economic Collapse
The group is located about 70 kilometers from Gulu City in Amuru district, in a lesser-known Lukulia Village in Atiak Town Council. The scars of the 1995 Atiak Massacre by the Lord’s Resistance Army rebels are still fresh for many of its nine members. Up to seven are women of advanced age. They look after 44 goats, out of which 26 are the local goat breeds while 18 are hybrid goats. They were all acquired with support from Climate Smart Jobs.
Mega FM interviewed several members of the Farmer Group Enterprise who indicated that for generations, crop farming has been the backbone of livelihoods in Atiak Sub-County, adding that several crops would perform well, including traditional staple foods such as rice, cassava, millets, simsim, beans and maize.
By 1995, the rebel Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) was still active in the Atiak sub-county area, carrying out atrocities that displaced residents to live in military-protected camps for internally displaced persons (IDP) accross northern Uganda. On April 20th, 1995, about 300 rebel fighters attacked the Atiak IDP camp under the leadership of the second in command of the group, Vincent Otti, himself a son of Atiak, and brutally massacred an estimated 250 people, the majority of whom were economic pillars of their households.
Mourning this sudden economic loss has been slow and painful in this community. Frustrations built among residents amid changing weather patterns characterised by flash floods, prolonged dry spells, short rainfall periods and acute loss of soil fertility.
For long, the residents believed that the ghosts of those killed during the massacre haunted their farmlands as a way of avenging the atrocities. As time went by, they hoped that the International Criminal Court (ICC) would bring Vincent Otti to justice.
To date, Otti remains unseen. He is believed, however, to have been killed by Joseph Kony, the elusive rebel leader of the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) who was indicted by The Hague based Court.
The changing weather patterns and reliance on homemade seeds kept on gradually reducing the agricultural productivity potential of the once food basket over time, as farmers lacked sustainable access to improved seeds. More economic frustrations built livelihoods’ uncertainty in the area as farmers could not self-innovate to adapt to the fast-changing climate over the last two decades.
Small networks of farmers began looking for practical ways to protect both their food security and their incomes through different enterprises, including rearing small-bodied local goats.
Alal Beatrice, an elderly member of the group, has spent the last five years of her life rearing such local goats but has earned very little profit from the business due to the poor quality of the livestock and low production. Instead of practicing a free-range system, population pressure on the land restricted her farming to tethering her goats. One day she was too tired to return the animals back home, and as a result the goats were forced to endure long rainy nights.
“My business soon got attacked by frequent incidents of diseases and pests. The goats’ numbers were declining rather than increasing. Abortion was commonplace as water sources dried up,” she says.
Alal was forced to sell off some goats to pay village court fines after her goats encroached and ravaged her neighbors’ crop fields. Peace remained perpetually distant. Household poverty increased as trade became nearly impossible despite high demands for goats for cultural and social needs.
Alal’s business faced several challenges, including a lack of capital for expansion, poor breeding methods, low immunity, and a lack of knowledge, amongst others.
The breakdown of 44 goats on the Benaaps Business Solutions Limited Farm: 26 local goats, 16 hybrids, and two boers.
Preventive Livestock Healthcare
Preventive livestock healthcare aims to keep the farmers’ animals as healthy and productive as possible amidst changing climates. The strategy of prevention is better than curing, which aims at stopping productivity problems before they happen among herds.
Lincoln Nyakudanga, a livestock consultant working with Climate Smart Jobs specializing in goat breeding in Northern Uganda, says, “Preventative livestock healthcare includes all the practical steps that a farmer can take to stop infectious diseases (illnesses that can be spread from one animal to another) from affecting his or her livestock.”
This includes vaccinating them to stop or reduce the effects of diseases such as diarrhea, viral infections, goat pox, contagious ecthyma, and viral pneumonia, as well as bacterial diseases like tetanus, brucellosis, mastitis, and metritis.
Others are foot and mouth disease, lumpy skin disease, and mycotic diseases such as dermatophytosis and rickettsial infections like conjunctivitis, which are common causes of goats’ mortality in Uganda’s rural areas.
According to Mr. Nyakudanga, preventive healthcare also involves treating internal parasites (worms) and external parasites (such as ticks) effectively, as parasites can become resistant to veterinary drugs. Hygiene, proper grazing management, watering, and proper care of kids are integral parts of prevention.
“Preventive healthcare also involves taking biosecurity measures. These are actions that reduce the risk that animals will catch infectious diseases and include managing contact between farmers’ animals and restricting the number of visitors to breeding areas where livestock are kept. Otherwise, applications of recommended disinfectants, such as foot dips, must be applied,” the livestock expert advised.
Preventive healthcare goes beyond the above direct steps to prevent diseases. It also involves taking actions to ensure that livestock are as healthy and productive as possible, such as improving nutrition and housing, managing reproduction, and the way they breed. This can be achieved by choosing the right breeds for a farmer’s situation and managing the intervals between each birth while dealing with infertility problems among the herds. Properly managed reproduction can have a big impact on productivity.
From Training to Practice
By 2025, Climate Smart Jobs introduced such measures to members of the Benaaps Farmer Group Enterprise in view of building their resilience to Climate Change and combating household poverty. A reproduction compliance raised shelter sitting inside a perimeter wire mesh fence was constructed for the group before they were supported to procure a hybrid variety. Group members received training in preventive healthcare and agribusiness skills. They were oriented to best practices such as making and keeping a business plan of action, a document detailing the steps livestock keepers must take to prevent disease and improve the health of their animals, and when those steps can be taken at the exact most time of need.
Charles Ayella, the group’s chairperson, told Mega FM that their training emphasized the fact that “preventive livestock healthcare measures like vaccination minimize animal deaths and serious diseases during outbreaks because sick animals can infect both people through contact or consumption of their meat and other livestock when they share grazing and breeding spaces.”
Today, the group can effectively quarantine sick goats as they have been equipped with four different, spacious, and partitioned sections. There are also plenty of play areas behind the gated perimeter fence for both kids and adults. The group’s main goal now is to prevent these livestock from getting sick, and to help increase the farm productivity before they can sell and earn income.
So far, mortality and abortion among the herd have reduced; the preliminary signs of hopes according to Alal. Goat breeding promises to be one of the most climate-resilient practices rural small-holder farmers can engage in, as goats can significantly survive on fairly any vegetation that many other animals cannot effectively utilize in the worst of a season. They also require relatively little space to rear, reproduce quickly, and provide families with multiple sources of value for farmers facing a shortage of land. Meat for family nutrition. Manure improves degraded soil fertility. And income during times of financial need.
According to Ayella, the chairperson of Benaaps Business Solution Limited, the support of Climate Smart Jobs has already opened the gateway to the billion-dollar South Sudan markets as buyers from across the border flock to their breeding center for purchases already.
“We believe that we will sell a hybrid goat for between 250,000 and 500,000 Uganda shillings for each due to the upcoming demands from South Sudan and neighbouring districts such as Adjumani,” he stated.
Within Atiak Sub-County and Northern Uganda in general, local goats cost between 100,000 and 150,000 shillings for adults weighing between seven and nine kilograms. Due to poor feeding practice and quality, achieving such weights takes a long time.
Irene Amony, 45, a resident of Lukulia Cell in Atiak Town Council, is another member of Benaaps Business Solution Limited. She is a teacher by profession. Joined the group to diversify her income and save for the future. During this media visit, she was the group member on duty to take the livestock out to graze and water. There is a plan to sink and install a solar-driven borehole for the farmers following training on hay making and feed supplementation. The hay-making machine is already part of the support to the group.
Veterinary Services
The Government of Uganda set up Gulu University in Gulu City as an agriculture college to transform communities in the Northern Uganda region. Its faculty of Agriculture and Environment has trained so many veterinary service providers who are already providing extension services to farmer groups like Benaaps.
Dr Collins Okello is an Associate Professor, Senior Lecturer, and Dean of the Faculty of Agriculture and Environment at Gulu University. He told Mega FM that the climate change phenomenon is no longer a distant threat for farmers in the region, as several studies have indicated that the average temperature of the region rose by about 0.8 degrees Celsius over the past three decades.
“To an ordinary farmer, the increment sounds negligible. To us, environmental scientists, we understand that it is significant enough to destabilize the rainfall patterns of the region, especially when correlated with the massive forest destruction that happened in the region,” he explained.
Indeed, the region’s protective natural forests majority of which grew on private land, were decimated for Charcoal production as displaced persons retreated home from the camps for internally displaced persons. Some were cleared for the establishment of commercial farms.
Exposed to climate vagaries, professionals like Dr. Okello are busy in the field training farmer group members to become veterinary paraprofessionals capable of providing basic emergency first aid to sick or injured livestock, spraying ticks, and administering dewormers as they wait for certified veterinary caregivers to vaccinate their animals.
“We are training community members to first of all know how to read effective labels on dose medication for them to purchase medicine from a trader, how to qualify or disqualify its quality or whether the right dosage is administered.” Dr. Okello said during an interview with Mega FM from the Faculty of Agriculture and Environment.
If the dosage is too low, it may not be effective, and if it’s too high, it might be harmful/toxic to the livestock, humans, and the environment in general. Farmers must therefore calculate the right dosage and apply it correctly for best treatment outcomes in their herds.
Uganda’s veterinary law, available at the Ministry of Agriculture, Animal Industry and Fisheries, restricts the sale of illegal veterinary medicines and ensures that veterinary products are stored correctly so that they remain effective. For example, many vaccines need to be kept cold even while being transported to the farms by Vet service providers.
When blended with regular on-the-farm visits, people who offer treatments and advice must physically observe animals, how they are being kept, and provide more tailored and relevant livestock production advice than a pharmacist who simply sells veterinary drugs from a shop. According to the Ministry of Agriculture, Uganda had an estimated 13.5 million goats by 2015, with about 95 percent being indigenous breeds. The ministry says improving genetics through selective breeding remains one of the most effective ways of increasing productivity and household incomes.
The East African country earns over US$ 4.1 million (approx. UGX 15.7 billion) annually from live goat exports, while goat meat (chevron) exports add roughly US$ 11,000. The broader live animal export sector (including cattle, sheep, and pigs) generates approximately US$ 43.5 million per year.
Lessons from Benaaps Farm Solutions Limited indicate that women and men may carry out different but complementary livestock management activities, depending on traditional practices and social norms. It is therefore clear that actively involving both men and women in matters related to providing animal health care ensures successful outcomes. The Production of this story was supported by InfoNile in Partnership with Climate Smart Jobs.
