We've travelled to Karamoja in order to assess relevance and opportunities to provide basic financial services in this area. The trip is long, beautiful, rough and at times a bit dangerous - though fortunately not due to bullets.
The major town in Karamoja is called Moroto and it is located at the foot of a large mountain that provides a magnificent view across the vast land. As we've traveled on a Sunday there is still some time to climb up Mount Moroto...
In Moroto a small bank branch provides practically just one type of service and only once a month: paying out the salaries of teachers and soldiers.
What appears to be filling the gap are simple and small-scale self-organised groups that provide possibilities to safely deposit money and give out small credits. Visiting one of these groups we find the typical rural setting of villagers gathering under a tree and holding their meeting like a small ritual.
The approach seems to be adequate and helpful, we'll look at this in more detail.
Then, I have to leave back to Kampala a few days before the others, so I'm hopping into a tiny prop airliner - uahhh...
Though the flight is a bit bumpy, I am rewarded with absolutely thrilling views as we fly half across Uganda.
My goodness, sometimes I can't believe that I'm actually getting paid doing this ;-)
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