Damning statistics from Bank of Uganda (BoU) and Uganda Bureau of Statistics (UBOS) indicate that only 12% of Ugandans have bank accounts while less than 5% save their monthly earnings regularly. But all is not lost though. Financial literacy, according to the Central Bank, has been recognized as a critical factor in tackling this problem, improving the quality of life and enhancing financial inclusion in the country.
Meet Aisha Ali, a woman determined to tackle this problem from the grassroots, through her organization, ‘I Profile Foundation’, a social enterprise that focuses on child centered programs with an emphasis on leadership, financial literacy and entrepreneurship.
Aisha is an award winning Entrepreneur, trainer, global shaper, Ye Co -Ambassador and a certified financial literacy coach with Bank of Uganda. She also facilitates at the ‘Academy for Women Entrepreneurs’, which is an initiative of the White House.
Aisha was inspired to start the organization following harrowing observations of how youths struggled with transitioning from school to work life.
“After school, I saw how fellow youth struggled to start businesses and hardly had a grip on understanding their finances. I realized that it is prudent for us to ensure we teach practical entrepreneurship skills and help them understand financial literacy early to prepare them for a later time in life.”
Launched in 2015, ‘I Profile foundation’ is an organization that is building the future generation by investing in training the necessary life skills today. “We take our participants through practical training in areas of Leadership, Finances, Legacy, Etiquette and Entrepreneurship. We focus on ensuring that the participants learn what it means to grow into the movers of our economy and country as they learn to take on the responsibility.”
Part of the initiative runs a project ‘Hope Hub’ which provides entrepreneurial skills, access to finance and markets for urban refugee women and children.
“Our community outreaches mainly focus on financial literacy and entrepreneurship. Children usually want to know about money, its history, saving, budgeting and how to start a business.”
Among its strategies to achieve its goals, the foundation has done a number of collaborative projects with other organizations, with the latest one being the ‘Aflateen Program’ with ‘Aflateen International’, that is designed for young people as a self and community exploring program.
“We chose to take this program and implement it with refugees and it has gone a long way in helping them with self-discovery and understanding the new society they have to live in.”
The foundation has registered a number of success that includes running the ‘Koin Dream Challenge’, a financial literacy program for children under the age of 3. “We have also started a refugee assimilation program, the Hope Hub that helps assimilate refugees with in the host communities by training them in language and practical skills.”
Aisha notes that as a woman, sexism remains the greatest challenge she faces in her day today line of work. “Unfortunately people are still sexist in their thinking and many a time, they underestimate me simply because I am female. Several times, I need to work twice as hard as my male counter parts to create an impact.”
However, at the end of the day, nothing beats the joy of seeing positive outcomes from the projects the organization runs.
“When we started the ‘Aflateen program’, we had to ask the participants where they came from but one of the participants responded that they hated to talk about the past because they don’t want to remember it. After two lessons, the same participant was now willing to share fully about his past and was encouraging others to share too.”
Aisha advises women to improve on their financial literacy for a great quality life. “Women should do everything possible to work on improving their financial literacy but more to it, they should start the small practical steps to financial freedom like having a budget.”
To be a part of any projects with ‘I Profile Foundation’, please reach out to them on their different media platforms including Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and email at iprofilefoundationug@gmail.com.
