25 Feb 2013

Uganda is strange, but interesting place. In many ways, it lives in the the 21st century: there is internet (albeit somewhat limited), the ubiquitous smartphone, and it is easier to pay for goods and services with one's mobile phone here than it is in Chicago. In many ways, however, Uganda is less developed than the Roman empire: where the Romans developed the Arch and elaborate cities and bridges, many Ugandans still reside in small single-room wood or mud huts; where the Romans incredible aqueducts transport water from the mountains, many areas of Uganda still pump water from the ground manually or depend on rainwater; and where the Romans developed elaborate underground sewage systems to transport waste, excrement and refuse still pollute smaller community open air drainage ditches contributing to a significant burden of disease.

This is not to say that everyone here lives in absolute poverty. On the contrary, there are areas of Kampala, for example some of the 5-star resorts, that parallel even the most expensive foreign hotels. Indeed, there are Ugandans easily able to afford such luxuries. Nonetheless, the vast majority do live without resources most Americans would consider essential to daily life.

So, what is being done and why do things remain the way they are? I think the medical community has made significant strides in bringing some semblance of 1st-world healthcare to the impoverished here in Uganda, but the hard reality is that for the vast majority of Ugandans, healthcare is at the bottom of a long laundry list of needs. While those of us that are able and willing to help would love to contribute more, our skill sets, knowledge and ability to contribute are limited by the degree of our specializations. Indeed, the skills and industries I think Uganda needs most are those that have long been forgotten in industrialized countries.

From the 18th century to the turn of the 20th century, the US labor force underwent a dramatic shift. Individual skilled labor was gradually replaced by mass production at factories which was then quickly replaced by automated machinery en masse. Whereas small towns in America at one point might have been self-sustaining with at least one farmer, tailor, butcher, blacksmith, carpenter and doctor among other professions, many small towns now serve merely as residential areas. Indeed, the introduction of automated machinery reduced the need for many factory jobs freed the work force to further develop fields such as research, medicine, law, or economics, and, in addition, allowed for the definition of newer vocations like web designer, artist, or interior designer.

Africa and Uganda missed this proverbial 200 year-old boat. As a result, the part of Uganda that was able to latch onto the British occupation was dragged into the 21st century with many second-hand 21st century amenities. The basic unit of rural Uganda, however, is still a self-sustaining family that grows it's own food, makes it's own bricks, builds it's own huts and draws its own water. There is no specialization of labor, and as a result basic technology has not advanced. There is no mason to construct the archway, no plumber to configure the sewage, and no blacksmith to melt down the iron and forge the tools. Such skills, which were necessary predecessors to our own industrial revolutions, have mostly been forgotten. As a result, rural Ugandans might, at best, vie for educational opportunities to land them in vocations that the industrialized world actually knows how to create jobs for.

Personally, I don't think this top-down approach is working all that well, or if it is, it is happening very slowly. I think the upper echelons of society do benefit somewhat, but the bottom does not truly experience the trickle-down effect. I think combining this top-down approach with some bottom-up support is necessary to bringing the whole of Africa and Uganda into the modern era.