News from a former fellow from Uganda

Joel Charles Owona took part in the Land Restoration Training Programme’s (LRT) six-month training course in 2008. He used to work as a District Environment Officer in Pader District in northern Uganda – a region which suffered from war for a long time. The subject of Joel’s project during his LRT study was the internally displaced Person’s  (IDP) camps in Pader district, with an emphasis on the extent to which land and other natural resources around the camps were affected during the war and possible measures to be taken. After Joel returned back home, he and his colleagues planted 6000 trees around the former IDP camps with the purpose of restoring the degraded ecosystems after the war, with support from the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

Joel is currently an employee of the Ugandan Government as a Senior Wetlands Officer in the Ugandan Ministry of Water and Environment. He is responsible for promoting the use of environmental and land resources such as soils, water, animals and plants for the production of goods – to meet changing human needs – while assuring the long-term productive potential of these resources, and the maintenance of their environmental functions.

The UNU-LRT team wishes Joel all the best in his important work in Uganda!