“We are incredibly proud of Umar Ochen Bashir, our young changemaker from Uganda, who won the prestigious Ursula Hudson Award at this year's Terra Madre Salone del Gusto in Turin, Italy,” said Josephine Rodgers, Access Agriculture Executive Director. “This is a well-deserved recognition for Bashir and a huge boost to all our young changemakers across African countries and India.”
The award, named in honour of the late Ursula Hudson who led the Slow Food movement in Germany and around the world, recognises committed people, who have made an extraordinary contribution to the development of a fairer and more sustainable food system, and have become role models in this mission.
The Slow Food movement focuses on the preservation of indigenous food traditions and biodiversity, and the promotion of agroecology. Bashir is a leader of the Slow Food Community, called the ‘Toyoro Kongokinyinyir Nopimpim’ (Survive with Your Sweat), in Karamoja in Northwest Uganda, where the challenges are immense as it one of the driest and most food-insecure regions in the country.
Bashir received the Ursula Hudson award for his outstanding efforts to help indigenous agropastoral communities of this region adopt sustainable farming practices to combat food insecurity and build resilience in the face of climate change. The award includes a EURO 5,000 prize, which will support Bashir in advancing his important work in Uganda.
Bashir’s mission to empower local communities has been further strengthened through his activities as the leader of an Entrepreneur for Rural Access (ERA) team, where he provides e-advisory services to support FAO’s Farmer Field School programme in Karamoja region to build climate-resilient capacities and improve rural livelihoods.
The ERA concept is an initiative of Access Agriculture to involve youths as rural changemakers who are given a solar-powered ‘smart projector’ to make a business by screening farmer-training videos in remote villages.
As an ERA, Bashir has been actively training local communities, particularly rural youths, in various aspects of agroecology using the smart projector he received from Access Agriculture. The smart projector contains over 4,000 training videos across 100 languages, including 50 videos in Karamojong language, spoken in the Karamoja region.
Thanking Slow Food and the Ursula Hudson Award committee, Bashir said, “I am deeply honoured to receive this prestigious international award and happy that my passion to train local communities in agroecology principles and practices in the hard-to-reach areas of Karamoja has been recognised,” said Bashir. “I believe that my services as ERA to bring knowledge to farmers using the smart projector have contributed to this achievement.”
Bashir’s inspiring story as an ERA has been featured in Access Agriculture’s book “Young changemakers." Click here to read the full story.
Click here to download a free e-version of the book.
Photo courtesy: Slow Food
