Uganda: From Child Soldiers to Livestock Farmers

ROME— Technical workers and livestock farmers from Uganda have just completed a training course in Italy to teach former child soldiers the job of livestock farming. On their return from the fighting, the young people are in search of a role in the country’s southern communities. The project was promoted by the Italian Livestock Farmers’ Association (Italian initials AIA) with the support of the “Roma Capitale” organisation and is part of a decentralised cooperation programme.

The Development Cooperation’s guidelines on youth issues include “the protection of children and young people’s human and civil rights in conflict and post-conflict situations. This applies especially to unaccompanied children, orphans, survivors of the conflict and young people returning to their communities”. Italian Development Cooperation has therefore provided funding for a series of projects to help children and adolescents directly involved in armed conflict, or victims of war, in situations affected by fighting or its aftermath.

A number of initiatives have been set up jointly with the World Bank for former child soldiers in Sierra Leone and Liberia, as a direct follow-up to the commitments undertaken during the Freetown Conference in 2004.

SOURCE: Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs