Saturday Feeding & Clean Water Program

Greetings from St. Martin's School and the Kibagare Community. We hope all is well with you and your families.

We have continued with the school feeding and the Saturday Weekend feeding program since our last update. We fed 915 children at school every day, and we have held 10 weekend feeding programs since then, averaging 1,450 children from Kibagare and the surrounding settlements, many of whom rely on their school meals as their most reliable meal of the week.

Normally, the short rains begin in October, and as of today, most, if not all, areas have not received any rainfall yet; if nothing happens in the next few days, we are expecting massive crop failure, and in some instances, many will be forced to replant again with no guarantees of harvest. Schools have also closed for the long November-December holiday; most children have no guarantee of meals at home, with families facing high inflation and lack of employment. We expect that, come next year, food prices will go higher and there will be little to no harvest in 2027, with or without rains.

Schools reopened on the 28th of August 2026 for the third and final term of the year. We continued with the daily school feeding for the 915 children, which helps the children stay in school and worry less about their next meal. The Saturday feeding program has also been ongoing and it ensure that children from this lum and sorrounding slums do not have to fend for themselves and aslo guaranteed that they have a balanced meal over the weekend. We have served a total of 14,500 children between July and October.

With the shortfall in the October to December rains, we are not expecting much, though the farms have been prepared in anticipation of the rains. Several issues will follow in the coming months

• Crop failure due to lack of adequate rainfall meaning food prices will go up, high. Inflation, a high unemployment rate, a regressing economy, poor harvest, and more
• Children will be the most affected without the guarantee of the school feeding now that schools are closed for two months
• Children might be forced to fend for themselves due to the economic situation in their homes

With these challenges in mind we hope with continued support we can be able to use the resources we have to try and mitigate in some of these issues.

With the support we receive, we should be able to buy our food stock early in preparation for the coming year and also help the most needy of families from the slum with food baskets to be able to feed and sustain their families.

Your continued support is greatly appreciated by all here.

Thank you all.

Links:

• School Website