The Katine Project

The Guardian's Katine website was developed to document the process of development in Katine. In part, it is a fundraising push, but it also serves to increase the transparency of the project by looking at where and how money is spent, what is working and not working development-wise, and by posting project reports online. It also provides a platform for the people of Katine to share their lives with the world.

The Katine website contains a number of different sections, including interactive maps, where visitors can take a virtual tour through Katine village, Katine sub-county, Uganda, and Africa. For example, the village map includes images of particular locations in the village, videos, photo diaries, and interactive thematic 'scenes' where visitors can learn more about the state of health, food, education, community, and water in Katine.

Articles about Katine, both the work being done and the people who live there, are posted online and can be shared via all major social networking platforms, including Digg, Facebook, and Twitter. There is also a blog, "Katine Chronicles," where readers can follow the village's progress and post their own comments.

Over the course of the project, Guardian and Observer journalists visit Uganda to report on progress. A senior staff member from the Weekly Observer in Kampala has also been enlisted to spend two weeks each month in Katine to write regular news reports.

An important part of the Katine project is listening to its residents – finding out about their lives and giving them a forum to express their views, not only on the work of Amref and Farm-Africa in their communities, but also on the decisions made by Ugandan politicians in Kampala that could impact their lives. The NGO Panos, which works to strengthen media, debate and information in developing countries, will work to help empower locals to tell their stories, which can be read in the Village Voices section.

The site also includes a video section, where films taken in the village can be viewed. Many of the films have been produced by residents of Katine. In February 2009, the Guardian worked with residents to produce films about their daily lives using Flip video cameras. The short videos cover a wide range of settings and situations including life around the homestead, brick making, food and community, child workers, and the legacy of the Lord's Resistance Army (LRA).

The project is also encouraging schools to get involved in the project through the school resource section, which contains ideas for raising money, videos, and downloadable lesson plans.

Education, Health, Sanitation, Governance, and Livelihoods.

Key development goals that AMREF is working to improve in the Katine project include safer sanitation, improved wellbeing, better schooling, income generation, and community empowerment. Specific development projects include repairing and drilling water boreholes, constructing rain-water tanks and toilets, upgrading health facilities and training village health teams, training teachers and building school facilities, conducting training in agribusiness and marketing, and forming rural innovation groups, and conducting training in basic rights, planning and budgeting, and improving interaction with government.