21st Century Ugandan Businesswomen

"When I joined MTN Uganda as advertising manager, prior to that I’d been with advertising agencies so I have many years of advertising experience."

"My career journey is one I’m really grateful for, because obviously, I have worked for the big corporations that come to mind."

"That’s my childhood."

"Even when I go there now, I smell the air and it brings back childhood memories."

"I have fond memories of growing up in Kenya, Nairobi."

"I named it after the largest body of water on the continent."

"They told me I don’t have a business history and they cannot run such a risk. *They were not going to give me any money."

"The bank actually shut the door in my face."

"They said business is a male dominated area and that the private seed industry hardly existed in Uganda."

"Everyone said I was out of my mind."

"The training was for scientists but they brought me in as a woman in business."

"The following year I got the YARA award."

"In 2006 I was an AWARD grantee at IITA and this really transformed me as an individual."

"The bank then accepted to give me startup capital."

"They wrote me a letter to take to the bank to guarantee my loan if I fail to repay it."

"But what did I do? I went to a research project the East African Agricultural Productivity Programme and presented my plan."

"I pushed on and even picked up a name that would inspire me every day."

"That is a business for men, they told me."

"When I told my friends I was starting a seed company they thought I was out of my mind."

"You need confidence and to believe in yourself."

"This environment motivated me to start Victoria Seeds in 2002 because the policy was favorable."

"We can't operate our business without water, electricity or an access road,"

"But loans often are for a maximum of 12 months. Twenty-year loans are needed at low rates."

"To bring a seed from breeder stage to the market can take three years."

"Why not cut and paste for Uganda."

"If donors want to achieve their objectives, if they want to improve livelihoods, they should focus on businesses that add value to output."

"It is enterprises that are the critical drivers, they drive demand from farmers."

"Donors should focus on those higher up the value chain."

"Control pests and prevent post-harvest losses such as those caused by inadequate storage."

"We need people to advise farmers on how to apply fertiliser."

"There was an efficient extension service when I was growing up in the 1970s, but such extension is available to 14% or fewer farming households today."

"I'm much too loud, you have a horrible office, I'm not coming back."

"Once you come into secondary school, then you start forming lifelong relationships, especially from my secondary school and those are the lifelong relationships that I have now."

"I’ve got fond memories of childhood friends that I can no longer trace, because we were in this private British school."

"I’ve got fond memories of being in a private British school in Kenya."

"When I look back at my childhood, I’ve got fond memories of big family gatherings."

"That, then, made me be in a protected environment and yet helped me develop into a very independent person."

"Once you’re put in boarding school at a very young age, you’ve got to figure out life on your own quite early."

"When I say very pivotal in who I am today, it also made me very independent because I was put in boarding school when I was seven years old."

"That’s why I’ll say protected."

"I come from a huge extended family, and so there were always big cousins around, and protected in terms of when I look back now, in terms of privilege, because there’s so much that we could do that the average family could not do at the time."

"I say protected because my parents did their level best to afford us the best of what they could offer."

"Why do I say protected?"

"I’d describe my childhood as ‘very protected and yet very instrumental in who I am today’."

"I and the microphone can’t be put apart."

"I’m frequently doing public speaking engagements."

"I’m into public speaking, I take any opportunity, like every week, I am speaking to some people."

"What else can I say about me?"

"I am a Jesus lover and that really underpins my values as a person."

"I take that with a big spoon."