The Miracle Centre Church Senior Pastor, Robert Kayanja, has appealed to the Government to partner with progressive farmers to grow enough food to feed the hungry people in Karamoja sub-region.     

The pastor also appealed to churches and other people of God to join resources to feed the starving people, saying there was still serious shortage of food in all the districts of Karamoja despite his efforts to grow food in the area. 

Pastor Robert Kayanja meeting residents of Lobok village in Napak where he distributed food.

Kayanja said his mission was to ensure Karamoja sub-region turned into a food basket and is empowered to feed the rest of Africa.  

Kayanja was on Thursday, August 24, 2023, speaking after handing over sacks of freshly harvested short-sweet sorghum to families in the homesteads of Lobok village, Lorengecora sub-county in Napak district. 

The food, in 50kg sacks, ‘grown and packed in Karamoja’, was Kayanja’s first harvest from his farm, the Yeshua Life Limited under the Robert Kayanja Bucket Initiative.  

Some of the food that was given out.

Kayanja set up the farm in October last year and started clearing the fields in January 2023 on land donated by the communities to enable him grow enough food for the hungry people in Karamoja.  

The farm, located at Lomulaangale pan village in Lorengecora has 2,000 acres of sweet sorghum and Kayanja had to procure two combine harvesters to enable him harvest the cereals before preparing for the second planting season. He was led to the communities by the farm manager, Godfrey Lagu and coordinator, Sarafina Kodet.     

Kayanja said he expects to harvest not less than 700kg per acre from the total 2,000 acres of sorghum in a period of four months. 

“This is just in four months of one season, but if all of us came together and pulled resources, Karamoja can feed Africa,” he said, adding that many residents were already excited with the gardens, that even attract travelers who never knew the area had good soils to grow food.  

A hungry man, Ilukol Edapal feeding on biscuits given by Pastor Kayanja at Lobok village, Napak.

People and their children waiting to be given food.

“The people of Karamoja are happy with this, mainly because they know they own the project and have been encouraged to see powerful machinery like combine harvesters,” he said, adding that the project had also become a skills learning centre.    

Some of the residents who received free sorghum food from pastor Robert Kayanja in Napak district, August 24, 2023. (Photo by Eddie Ssejjoba)

People of Lobok village in Napak district return home after receiving food from pastor Robert Kayanja of the Miracle Centre.

“I am confident that Napak will soon become a model district,” he said. Kayanja was also preparing to plant 5,000acres of sorghum in the next season and his target was to grow 10,000 acreas in one season.   

“In one year, Karamoja will be able to feed Africa because we have good weather and good soils,” he said, adding that he recently met the President of Kenya, Dr. William Ruto and First lady Rachel Ruto who asked him to establish similar farms in the Turkana area. He said he had also got some experts from South Sudan and also wanted him to have similar farms in their country.  

Workers at the farm camp called Yeshua Life Limited under the Robert Kayanja Bucket Initiative in Napak, Karamoja sub region sieve freshly harvested sorghum from the 2,000 acres planted in April, 2023. (Photo by Eddie Ssejjoba).

Kayanja was received by the Lokiteded Town Council in Napak district, who is the former area sub-chief, Anthony Lemukol and later also received the Napak deputy Resident District Commissioner, Ahamed Fardoz, who came with a team to thank him for what she described as ‘wonderful’ project in Karamoja. 

“We still have more land in any part of Karamoja and if you want to expand this project, we are willing to work with you and we don’t want this project to end here in Napak,” Fardoz said.   

Lemukol said this was a good project because it had created employment opportunities for the people of Napak, for both the skilled and unskilled youths. He said the majority of the beneficiaries were the unskilled laborers, who were employed on the project during the bush clearing, planting and weeding.

“We are happy that many of our people were employed here and each was earning between sh5,000 and sh7,000 a day and the project employed over 700 workers per day during time of weeding,” he said. He said there was still serious food shortage in the district because people don’t have seeds for planting in the next season.