The Senior Presidential Advisor on Diaspora Affairs – Office of the President, in conjunction with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Internal Affairs, and other Government Agencies, have embarked on a journey of diaspora mapping, a process of identifying, documenting, and analyzing the demographics, skills, and networks of Uganda’s Diaspora communities. Starting with North America, Europe, Asia and Oceania. The goal of diaspora mapping is to understand the size, distribution, and characteristics of Ugandan diaspora groups, as well as to explore on how well, their potential can better contribute to the development of Uganda and themselves.
With Support from the Office of the President, Amb. Abbey Walusimbi, and team have today 29th June 2024, left for USA, to start on this noble assignment of diaspora mapping. The team will start with California, Massachusetts, Texas and Illinois, among other states. There after head to Canada – Toronto and Ottawa, to meet the different disapora chapter members to explore and assess immediate and long term needs that can inform policy.
The Ugandan diaspora community makes significant contributions to the country’s economy; in 2022, remittances from the Ugandan diaspora community reached $1.42 billion, a 13.4% increase from the previous year. Diaspora investments in agribusiness, educations, Tourism, export promotion, commercial diplomacy and other sectors have contributed to Uganda’s economic growth and job creation tremendously.
Thus, the Ugandan government and President Yoweri Museveni, recognizes the importance of the diaspora community’s contributions and has established the Special Presidential Advisor Diaspora Affairs to engage with and support all Ugandans living abroad.
The objectives of diaspora mapping will among others include;
Establishing Demographics, population size, geographic distribution, age, gender, and occupation.
Skills sets; education, qualifications, and professional expertise and explore best way for knowledge transfer and innovation.
Build Networks; social, cultural, and economic connections within the diaspora communities and the country of origin – Uganda.
Remittances; improve financial flows sent back to the country and ensuring value for money sent by diaspora.
Investment; potential for investment in businesses, real estate, or other ventures.
Gathering data for Informing policy formulation and programs to engage diaspora communities.
Whereas there over 4 million Ugandans in the diaspora and contributing extensively to Uganda, there a lot of challenges they face that require deliberate Government attention and support. It’s against this background, we have started on Global Diaspora mapping that will inform policy.
Among the challenges faced by diaspora communities include but not limited to;
The challenges faced by our diaspora communities are a lot more than documented, some are social, political, economical, and different host countries treat immigrants differently. There over 4 million Ugandans in the diaspora, and all needs to be done to streamline this community. The African Union 6th region among other global organizations have evolved to address diaspora issues and enhance dignity and quality life of diaspora communities of African origin.
Cultural preservation: Diaspora communities struggle to maintain their cultural identity and language, especially when surrounded by a dominant culture. This will require enhancing diaspora associations.
Integration and belonging; Diaspora communities experience difficulties integrating into their new host country and feeling a sense of belonging. This cause loss of identity and producing a generation that have no belonging, and patriotism.
Access to resources and services: Diaspora communities still face challenges accessing resources and services, such as healthcare and education, in their host country.
The challenges are a lot more, home sickness, voicelessness, isolation, lack of legal documents, remittances, loss of their hard earned income to dishonest family and relatives back home, citizenship and residency rights,language issues, career growth, quality housing, among others.
The Government foreign missions, different diaspora leagues / associations and all task force committees will be very instrumental in supporting the shaping out of this noble effort. We shall share a detailed schedule for roll out plan in the near future. I wish to thank our President and the entire Government for the support and guidance to our diaspora communities.
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