COMMUNITY FOUNDATION STORIES FROM EAST AFRICA, 2025.
Future Generations Foundation spent 2025 doing something remarkable in Uganda. They built the country’s first digital medicinal plant repository. Indigenous botanical knowledge that lived for generations only in oral tradition is now accessible to researchers, students, conservationists, and local communities. The knowledge was disappearing. They preserved it.
Their climate action project with Global Fund for Community Foundations took a completely different approach to climate messaging. Communities shaped the message themselves instead of listening to external experts tell them what they should know. Through partnerships with Iraa the Granary, 32 East, Sunny Outdoors, Qi Sports, and Great Outdoors, they reached children, youth, artists, outdoor enthusiasts, corporate employees, and athletes. Storytelling, sports, art, nature-based activities. The messages resonated because communities created them.
What ties these initiatives together? Communities hold knowledge that matters. Digital tools preserved indigenous botanical wisdom. Creative engagement translated climate realities into messages people actually heard. The work required resources and community willingness. Success came from letting communities lead.
The lesson Future Generations carries is straightforward. Let communities lead. Not token participation where you ask for input then proceed with your plan anyway. Actual authority. When communities get trusted to shape the message, choose the methods, drive implementation, the work becomes more relevant, more credible, more sustainable. Local partners understand the realities best. Their leadership ensures initiatives respond to real needs rather than external assumptions. Creating space for community ownership strengthens impact, builds trust, enables long-term engagement.
