By Edward Magumba Uncategorised 0 Comments

The visit to Victory Church in Ndebba, Kampala

69219448_422547381802065_2217676629231009792_nNSDThe visit to Victory Church in Ndebba, Kampala.

Yesterday in the morning, I attended an agricultural workshop at victory church in Ndeeba in Kampala, The workshop which closes today 16th August 2019 is held annually and I was told this was their 7th. This has been my first time to attend it. Lots of presentation were made by different agricultural experts.

Officials from bank of Uganda also made presentations telling us about an agricultural finance facility with very low interest rates,i think within the range of 10-15%.

In the church park-yard where different exhibitors of agricultural stuff.

I was happy to see this, to me it seems like more and more Ugandans are finally waking up from sleep and taking agriculture seriously. According to recent figures from the Uganda bureau of statistics, Uganda exports or receives $2.5 billion and Imports $4.5 billion. Our shortfall is $2 billion. If we were a business, we would be a loss-making one. Now, how are we going to bridge that gap if we are not engaging in production and fair trade with other countries?

Where will the food to feed the over 40 million Ugandans come from? And is it a good idea to continue importing junk food from China and other countries when we can easily grow our own?
If we produced little and lived a simple life that would be okay. But we don’t produce much and yet want to live a comfortable life based on imported food and other stuff (like cars,TVs,Phones, clothes, electronics, etc),then what happens next? Our shillings continue losing value.

Our people need to be mobilized to for example grow mangos on a large scale, may be even set up a mango processing/value addition plant .That way, some of us will stop buying imported mango juice and opt for this locally made, this would drive the local revenues up and also provide employment to our people.

Blessings – Edward

By Edward Magumba Uncategorised 0 Comments

Visit to Busoga Farmers Resource Centre.

Visit to Busoga Farmers Resource Centre.

Yesterday I led a team from church to the farm of Pastor Dauson Musasizi located in Busembatia area in Namutumba district, about 50kms outside of Jinja. The pastor and his team are engaged in different farming activities.On his 25 acre farm he grows fish, cattle, Bananas, bees, beans, oranges,coffee,etc. He also makes organic pesticides and fertilizers. He has a training center for those interested in modern farming. He is making millions of shillings every year from his modern farm while his neighborNAMUTUMBAs and others are sleeping with their land idle.

He told me a story of how he one time offered to train all pastors in Namutumba district for free in modern farming methods plus donation of up to 100 free banana suckers to each pastor. He told me that many pastors declined the offer and only a few went for the training. Some claimed that they were not ‘called’ to be farmers! Well, maybe so. In Genesis 2:8, 2:15, we see that God himself planted a garden and instructed Man to work and take care of the Garden of Eden.

Now,Namutumba district is very remote and rural area.Subsistence farming is the main activity that majority of people, including those we pastor,there engage in on a daily basis. Everyone in this district including pastors have to eat every day. Well, maybe not everyone will be a farmer. But why should we import food from China when we can grow our own, even if for home consumption only. The habit of complaining and blaming others for our problems when we can do something,is one thing am tire of.

Pastors can play a big role in mobilizing rural people for community agricultural Transformation projects, but they would have to first buy into (believe in) these projects themselves before they can invite their followers to do the same.

Population of Uganda right now is about 40 million people, on top of that, Uganda’s growth rate is about 3.2, which means that about 1 million babies are born every year. Now where will the food to feed all these babies come from if we don’t mobilize our people to utilize their idle lands? Why should World food program(WFP)continue feeding Ugandans when we already have a big rare blessing in the form of fertile idle land?

Blessings – Edward

By Edward Magumba Uncategorised 0 Comments

The Amazing power of the Brain,surviving armed robbers and looking for solutions far away-

The Amazing power of the Brain,surviving armed robbers and looking for solutions far away- Ed

 

Yesterday morning at around 1:00am in the middle of the night, Julie developed strange internal pains, efforts to calm down and prayer for the pain to go away yield no positive results, the pain become more intense and persisted, so we decided to drive from Mayuge,where we had camped back to see our doctor in Jinja. The drive would last about an hour, and we thought it would be without any incident, well, it wasn’t.

On nearing Magamaga area at around 2:00am, I saw a long line up of vehicles had stopped, I thought police had mounted a check point or something, coming closer, we asked what was going on, people told us it was an operation by armed thugs who had blocked all incoming vehicles from Jinja side and Iganga. They blocked the road using two huge trailers. The security forces had tried to repulse them but ‘failed’. If it had been a Kiiza Besiege rally, I doubt if law enforcement fellas would have failed to disperse his supporters, but i guess this is Uganda.

When Julie saw what was going on, her pain immediately ‘disappeared’ and advised that we leave the area. Now see the amazing power of the brain-before reaching this danger area, she was visibly in a lot of pain. On seeing the danger we were in and imagining the harm the thugs could potentially inflict on us, the pain suddenly disappeared.
The extreme fear of an attack from the robber’s temporally took the pain away. Now her brain was no longer focusing on the pain but her safety/security. In our everyday life, what we focus on, is what we get, it’s as simple as that. If we focus on our pains/problems, we will feel them and get them. If we focus on solutions/opportunities in any situation, we will see them.

We have a fully qualified nurse at our school in Mayuge plus a well stocked clinic, but when the illness struck, we somehow ignored our own nurse; ignorantly thinking that maybe she will not be able to manage the illness. Our mind quickly ran to a doctor/nurse in urban Jinja town.

Well, on realizing that we couldn’t go through the armed robber’s blockage,We quickly coiled our tails, turned and drove back to Mayuge,then called our school nurse. Circumstances forced us to go to her.Sometimes in life, circumstances force us to do the right things.She was able to accurately diagnose the problem and gave us the right medications at no cost. I had ignored my own, yet solutions to our health problems lay with my own. Many other Ugandans, just like me,ignorantly think that solutions to our health problems, economic problems, social problems,spiritual problems,political problems, etc lay with people far away.

I see some people in Buwenda village ignoring their beautiful village churches and run to big churches in towns thinking that God resides only in big urban church buildings and miracles only happen there,yet the bible is very clear about that;- 1)God is a spirit and everywhere,John4:24) 2) where 2 or 3 are gathered in his name,Mathew 18:20, he will be there.We run to big towns, we run to foreign countries thinking solutions to our problems are there, yet the solutions are within us,within our localities/people.

Lessons learnt-1) What we focus on is what we get,2) Solutions to our problems lay with us.

Blessings – Edward

By Edward Magumba Uncategorised 0 Comments

Prominent Kampala city pastor visits Jinja.

Prominent Kampala city pastor visits Jinja.

A Prominent city pastor today visited and held dialogue with Jinja Pentecostal pastors under their umbrella Organization of Jinja Christian Leaders Fellowship. As usual we were all invited, and I did honor the invitation. The fascination that these guys have for armed body guards and airs of importance amazes me.

Then the self righteous attitude and judgmentalism of some of these guys is sickening to say the least. They are the ones who know who is a false prophet and who has a big portion of Balookole blood in him/her.
At the meeting today, we were told of different false prophets in the country and how we should shun them, and where possible even undermine their credibility on radio for those with radio/TV talk shows. Oooh my.. ooh my …
Many prophets/pastors  were cited, but much emphasis was laid on those who neighbor this Kampala pastor, so its very possible that he has an axis to grid with them. And somehow he is trying to enlist us into his uncalled for, battles, under the pretext of fighting false prophets.

The Bible (Mathew 24:11-27) is very clear about those so-called false prophets; it says that they will arise in the last days. So anyone who thinks that he will curtail their growth or even chase them off the face is the earth may be in for a big shock. Their presence is fulfillment of Biblical prophecy.

I wish we could all re-direct our energies and efforts into positive activities including Loving our enemies, spreading the Love of God, preaching the gospel, Loving one another regardless of our differences, caring for the needy,etc

Over 4 billion people in the whole world have not yet had an opportunity to hear the gospel of Jesus Christ. Please lets all reach out to them and stop undermining each other yet the harvest is still very large.

Blessings – Edward

By Edward Magumba Uncategorised 0 Comments

Visiting the Jinja agricultural show.

Visiting the Jinja agricultural show.agricultural show

Yesterday I visited the agricultural show, I went to the booth of “Farming God’s way” people.
Guess what I found? A Muzungu teaching us how to grow Matooke, Maize, beans,etc. Now, very few countries in the western world grow Matooke. But somehow these guys come here, learn about the natural strength of Uganda, which is good soils, then work along that area of our strength and reap big.

Jinja has plenty of white people who are engaged in large scale agriculture, while many of us Ugandans want to go to the west for wealth; the western people are running to Africa for economic opportunities that we Ugandans have failed to see. Over 70% of taxes collected in Uganda are paid by foreign owned businesses. Actually out of about 40 million Ugandans,only about 1 million Ugandans pay taxes. So who are the rest depending on ?

Blessings – Edward