Villagers Transform Their Town into a Sustainable City

A community project is rebuilding their destroyed village in Northern Uganda – and shifting their dependence towards solar energy and shea butter.

“I want us to be responsible for shaping the destiny and the future of the project,” says Ojok Okello, the London School of Economics graduate who invested his own money to create the ambitious project, Okere City. And to emancipate his community, Okello decided to invest in shea butter, “an important natural resource we were not harnessing,” whilst protecting and regenerating shea trees, an endangered species.

Built where the village of Okere Mom-Kok once stood, Okere City covers 200 hectares, has a school, a health clinic, a village bank and a versatile community hall, electricity for all powered by solar energy, and clean water. The Okere City project is built as a social enterprise, not a charity, to serve the community the best it can by involving its citizens in the decisions made for their own future.