Deaf Link Uganda has projects based in urban and rural environments designed to meet and serve the diverse needs of deaf and hard of hearing people in Uganda. Our work is geared towards providing support services that enable individuals achieve self-sufficiency and enhance self-confidence through realising one's potentials. Our grassroots community projects aim to advance the overall welfare of deaf and hard of hearing Ugandans by creating opportunities that ensure each person is respected and recognised as a significant resource - gifted with capabilities that are necessary to individual and national development.

Deaf Link Uganda - Eastern

At least eighty percent of deaf and hard of hearing Ugandans live in rural areas that are characterised by lack of infrastructure and appalling poverty levels. High prevalence of hearing loss is predominantly due to ear diseases and the absence of healthcare facilities necessary in the prevention and treatment of diseases that cause hearing loss. Rural environments are particularly disadvantaged and therefore further impede the welfare of deaf people.

Deaf Link Uganda - Eastern is a rural based outreach organisation in Eastern Uganda working with rural deaf and hard of hearing people. The organisation serves to promote their wellbeing, reduce isolation, create awareness and respond to challenges individuals face leading austere lives in deprived remote villages that are deprived of basic needs and services.

Urban Projects

+Community Based Education    read more

Provides education and information to deaf and hard of hearing youth living in urban, semi-urban and low income areas around Kampala district and beyond (we have had deaf people attend our programmes from Kenya, Rwanda and Tanzania). The Learning Centre for the Deaf provides educational programmes such as; Life Skills Training, Sexual Reproductive Health Education; Business Skills Training; Human Rights Information and Deaf Women's Forum. Conducted by skilled volunteers who are deaf, hard of hearing or hearing, staff members work as peer educators to impart knowledge, skills and share significant information on current issues in our local communities. We have links with mainstream organisations, such as, KiBO Foundation, Naguru Teenage Information & Health Centre and Straight Talk Foundation Uganda who have previously been involved with our project activities (including fundraising) - providing outreach educational programmes, especially on HIV & AIDS/STIs. We receive monthly publications of The Straight Talk newspapers and Youth Magazine.

+Tweyambe Deaf Development Project (TDDP)    read more

That poverty exists in the midst of great wealth and powerful human resources is an absurdity we aim to change. Deaf Entrepreneurs prove that despite persistent challenges, it is possible to find solutions to economic depravity, unemployment and dependency, in working to achieve economic empowerment and long term self-sustainability. (N. Kiyaga)

The majority of deaf and hard of hearing children are disadvantaged from a very early age. Unskilled and ill-prepared for a future working life, they become vulnerable to socio-economic deprivation, discrimination and exploitation. Self-employment therefore, is a viable solution - key to economic empowerment.

Tweyambe Deaf Development Project (TDDP) was set up in 2010 to support self-employed deaf and hard of hearing entrepreneurs managing their own business. This initiative aims to increase their economic capacities by providing loans at minimal interest rates.

Rural Projects

+Humanitarian Support for the Deaf   read more

To work effectively with disabled people in traditional societies, one needs to understand that rural areas present unique challenges, further aggravated by negative socio-cultural beliefs and attitudes towards disabilities which cause severe barriers to the wellbeing of those with disabilities.

This Project identifies deaf and hard of hearing people living under difficult circumstances that aggrieve their human dignity by providing support to improve their lives. We equally engage their families in finding solutions to factors that cause their deprivation, enabling greater understanding and appreciation of a deaf person within their family and community.

+Mobilisation Project   read more

This project began as a result of receiving a donation in kind of two bicycles from the Executive Director in response to problems of physical isolation experienced by the majority of deaf people - commonly cut off from one another because of remoteness of their villages and lack of infrastructure. As communication barriers intensify social isolation, this initiative brings the deaf together and supports the growth of strong rural Deaf Communities.