Amplifying urban refugee women livelihood stories, and ensuring that they are active actors in shaping business opportunity while conserving the environment through production of eco-friendly cooking briquettes from banana food waste of kampala

Paluku Kapiteni is a former United Nations-UN Staff Member in DR.Congo but actually living in Uganda as a Congolese refugee leader and community organizer who has lived in Uganda since 2010. Driven by a strong commitment to advancing the wellbeing and dignity of displaced communities, he founded the Refugee Grassroots Development Group in 2013, a community?based organization dedicated to supporting and empowering fellow refugees. The organization, located in katwe, Kampala, became fully registered in 2015 and continues to play a vital role in community mobilization, advocacy, and livelihood support.

As Founder and Managing Director, Paluku leads initiatives that strengthen social cohesion, enhance self?reliance, and amplify the voices of refugee communities. Through his leadership, he has become a respected advocate for inclusion, protection, and sustainable solutions for refugees living in Uganda.

History and location 

Located in the Urban Kampala, REFUGEE GRASSROOTS DEVELOPMENT GROUP(Ltd) is a refugee-driven Urban farming  and commercial agriculture initiative which started in 2013 and in year 2025 it got fully registered under the Uganda Non-Governmental Organization A ct,2016 .Also it is a  registered as a company by guarantee under section (18) of the Uganda companies Act 2012 as a fully registered, more innovative and community-driven initiative that may help strengthen the refugee response in the Uganda. 
Our priority in interventions is to engage in both commercial agriculture and environmental protection as to eradicate poverty, hunger and the unemployment challenge so, we look the way the way to support Our fellow refugees economically in order to achieve our own socio-economic transformation while conserving the environment.

  REFUGEE GRASSROOTS DEVELOPMENT GROUP(Ltd) involves in commercial agriculture such as production and commercialization of passion fruits, Coffee value chain in the Urban Mityana, kyenjonjo district and small-scale fish farming not only that we do provide the agricultural training programs then we provide seedlings to local trained members for the start. we train value addition it uses current local technology in growing passion fruits. we also teach them on how to use local fertilizers on the gardens so refugees have started making local juice for sell on local and country market.  

NB:our strategy is based on the support to the most vulnerable groups including women,youths,children,People living with disabilities and the Elderly people

Linkage with SHALOM

In year 2025,Refugee Grassroots Development Group registered a Networking organization ULONets Ltd (Urban Livelihoods Organization Networks) to help play significant roles in reaching out directly to refugees from door to door through mobilization of the mass of refugees to participate IRC/REBUILD Programs (eco-friendly briquettes production,mushroom and black fly soldiers production) inorder to help the mobilized refugees start their own registered organization (SHALOM INNOVATORS DEVELOPMENT GROUP) as an entrepreneurship strategy that benefit themselves through production and commercialization of eco-friendly briquettes they get from collected garbage of food waste in the urban Kampala.located in our premisses,SHALOM  group is a women-led initiative and our main role is to provide protection and Mentorship program to help everyone be able to earn a living.

We humbly invite donors, partners, communities, and friends to support our work and initiative at REFUGEE GRASSROOTS DEVELOPMENT GROUP Ltd, and help complement the Urban refugee response in Uganda

Thank you