AfiCom Mobile

My name is Masuba Aaron, I am a Ugandan aged twenty years. I am the Founder and President of AfiCom Resilience Group. This is a Hybrid Organization, both for profit and not for profit. I am a very strong and influential leader who is interested in creating and advocating for sustainability of community and surrounding. I am always defined by others as the voice for the voiceless especially during my Leadership positions that i have held since my early primary level up to High school where I held the top most position of Head Prefect.

I am also very good at building strong collaborative teams a skill that I developed as a Leader. I love learning and I believe that it is the key to unlock integrity. I am empathetic and kind, an easy to reach person.

About two billion individuals and tens of millions of enterprises around the World lack access to basic financial and business advisory services. 50% of the poor households who are unbanked represent an incredible economic barrier that prevents them from accessing the credit, savings and insurance services essential to the well-being of their families and businesses. For the small and medium enterprises who struggle to secure capital, this creates critical obstacles to their growth, as well as the economic and employment potential they represent. In addition, only three million jobs are created annually despite the thirteen million youths that join the workforce each year. As AfiCom Resilience Group, we are playing the part of large scale innovation through AfiCom Mobile. This is a platform that enables prospective and active entrepreneurs get access to credit, savings, marketing, legal, insurance and advisory services. This shall help ignite, propel and catapult entrepreneurial-ship activities.

In Africa, the youth population is rapidly growing and expected to double to over eight hundred fifty million (850,000,000) by 2040. Only three million formal jobs are created annually despite the thirteen million youths that join the workforce each year. Eighty percent of them that join rebel groups, riots and demonstrations are motivated by lack of an opportunity, thousands of deaths of migrant youths are recorded every year along the Mediterranean sea. Cases of vulnerable employment have also been common which have attracted sexual harassment and over exploitation of the youths. Nevertheless, refugees are also part of the vulnerable societies affected too.

The main challenge is that most of these are financially excluded and lack access to a network that can ignite, support, propel and catapult them through creating opportunities and good jobs.

I started a Resilience Group called AfiCom which is fully defined as African Initiative for Commercialization to be the network accessible and supportful in order to curb the exponentially growing problems. In order to increase our efficiency and reach out to many especially during these days of social distancing, Covid-19, we developed a Mobile application called AfiCom Mobile. We believe that sustainability begins with us integrating collectively.

AfiCom Resilience Group currently runs a Mobile application called AfiCom Mobile which extends savings, credit finance, Business Oriented Learning, Marketing, Legal, Insurance, and Advisory services which are essential to the well-being of families and businesses. 

This is done through simple step by step procedures which do not require an individual to physically travel from one place to the service center. Everything is done at one's comfort through our support team with just a click on the application.

The main aim is to ignite, support, propel and catapult the vulnerable populations like the youths, refugees and women into acquisition of skills for running businesses, then we extend credit facilities and support services in their projects and businesses such that they can sustainably run businesses that have net positive impact on the communities and help retrieve the lives and well-being of people.

Since the global community is increasingly becoming aware of the critical role financial inclusion plays in reducing poverty, promoting economic prosperity and catalyzing enterprise. Therefore we are to initiating notable strides in promoting access to finance through our large scale innovation to ensure that knowledge, capital and other essential facilities are accessible and appropriate to the needs of the underrepresented.

Our project of AfiCom Mobile through our initiative of AfiCom Resilience Group a Hybrid Organization, was established to reach out to the underrepresented and vulnerable societies especially the youths, refugees and women through training them, extending credit finance, savings, marketing, legal, insurance and advisory in order to create more opportunities and support the existing ones to expand and become more sustainable and efficient.

Such categories of individuals have been reportedly been suffering many obstacles especially in the job market and opportunities. Think about a life where one has the ability to do something but is surrounded by obstacles and there is no one to bail them out, this is what the young youths, refugees and women undergo through. This does not segregate whether one is learnt and educated or not. It is a common obstacle, and especially for those in the rural areas where wrangles on Arable land are still very common, it poses a very bi hurdle.

For the past two years since I graduated from High School, many of my fellows were not privileged to have an opportunity and when I interacted with them, the above were the challenges that I discovered which my project addresses.

In AfiCom Resilience Group, we strongly believe that the youths, refugees and women are the future of sustainability especially to the World's biggest problems such as poverty, food insecurity, inequalities, climate action, peace and strong institutions. However if such are still financially excluded or not supported, eradicating such challenges may be a dream come true. Therefore as AfiCom Group, we are elevating issues and projects in order to increase more opportunities for such to involve collectively to solve the World's complex problems.

I came up with AfiCom Resilience Group three months after graduating from High School. Most of my fellows were not able to get opportunities for employment, besides that, I learnt that some of them were not even able to graduate from High School because of different challenges with poverty being the root cause. Therefore all the same, those that had graduated and those that had not graduated did not have anything to differentiate but shared the common pull of lack of an opportunity. To some who tried something, were limited by support with finance and expertise of management being the leading problems. Some became vulnerably employed and could not avoid challenges like sexual harassment and over exploitation in addition to receiving very low wages that could not sustain their expenses.

This was the generation of the drama, that put me out of my comfort as a Leader since most of them could easily approach me. 

I began using my monthly salary which was about US $ 100 a month to support and mentor those that could begin various projects and collectively we created some jobs and employment opportunities. 

Having discovered that they were many to impact, I designed AfiCom Mobile.

As a Leader, I have always loved seeing sustainability in everyone's life no matter how big the challenge may be because there has never been a big hurdle that man can not overcome. Having been born into a single mom parented home, our dad had dropped us and went his own way. I saw the challenges women went through, to raise their children. Life was really hard. My mom did not have elementary primary education but she believed that sha could do something to earn a living and support us in school but there was no one who could support her, she was offered an opportunity of painting windows but she was vulnerably employed. The pay was very little and in addition sometimes she was laid off which made her jobless.

I figured out my ways to obtain education and through the help of volunteers and my good academic background enabled me to make it through in School. This was by scholarships and bursaries offered to me at different levels which was not a general opportunity for all.

I strongly believe that their are many more who are like my mom, my fellow youths and refugees that need support.

I have lived in such societies where such people that are voiceless and vulnerable are, there is no one to help them and I know how best they need to be helped. There is a lot such people can do to create sustainable futures and I have tested the goodness in helping them.

Regardless of my leadership skills, I am a very excellent Mathematician and Economist which have been key especially in my training and mentoring sessions which have helped develop twenty entrepreneurs who have successfully created about eighty five more employment opportunities for the youths through different ventures with Agriculture and Industry being the leading sectors.

I have come to learn that if we help more and more of such through extending mentorship and knowledge in the Learn and Connect Programs in the AfiCom Resilience Group platform, more can get motivated and empowered, then through extending credit facilities, savings, market, legal and insurance, we can truly develop strong institutions and good jobs.

Being vested with the above, these position me well for running this program. I also have a good network with fellows in the fields of Law, Education, Social Science, Humanities and Engineering which are added advantage and have helped me to build my team stronger.

Situation that are not pleasing can not be avoided, one of those that I encountered was a Conflict which developed amongst the youths that i was helping and were on my training program, this was during the time when I hired machinery to plough their gardens, everyone wanted to have the first position, when it came to resource distribution, some wanted to have more than the others. It was a very strong conflict that some wanted to turn against me who was otherwise volunteering to help them using my monthly salary. When it came to advising the youths in certain aspects, they never wanted to go with my advise and thought that they understood more than I did.

This implied that I had to use very strong skills of conflict resolution and management because nevertheless; I was much interested in building a very strong and collaborative team that would cooperate at all times and have a net positive impact on community.

These conflicts did not stop me from doing what I was esteemed to do, I persevered and talked to them still in a more professional way because I knew the distinction between them and I that revenge couldn't solve.

Regardless of the Conflicts that I encountered, What has fully defined me as a Leader is how to deal with the conflicts such that all parties are can work together again.

As a Leader of experience since childhood, I have learnt that Conflicts are not something that one can avoid, I have also learnt that they have both positive and negative impacts. But what matters most is to understand how to manage conflicts. In my extension programs where I train the youth, refugee and women entrepreneurs, I added Conflict resolution and MAnagement as part of their programs and I always tell them that one of the things that they will not avoid along the way are conflicts. These may either make them better persons or worse individuals. But the best is to become a better person.

As a Leader, I have managed to reconcile individuals and this has made them better ones than before building long lasting friendships and relationships.

One of such moment was for the two friends of mine who had vowed not to even kill each other because of competition for a spray machine in the tomatoes garden, this was because of scarcity but now are friends.

The multi-task, diverse, easy and quick, cheap, time saving, instant and simple procedures make the AfiCom Mobile app innovative. 

The platform breaks barriers such as transport costs, time wastage and limited accessibility to essential services required by business managers. These are very essential and vital for successful and effective running of ventures.

Since they have been challenges to many, we believe that through our large scale integration of innovative technology, we shall transform Africa. 

Through the operations of AfiCom Resilience Group, of extending essential services like Business Oriented Learning, Savings, Credit, Marketing, Legal, Insurance and Advisory services. Vulnerable populations and initially excluded societies and communities shall be catapulted into entrepreneurial activities with a net positive impact on their communities which shall also ensure financial inclusion and good jobs creation, which shall therefore reduce levels of unemployment.

As more people receive employment opportunities within our network, they shall be occupied as well as they earn incomes. The incomes shall increase their purchasing power and access to basic services such as shelter, clothing, primary education, food and health services which are key to their well-being, this shall therefore improve their standards of living.

Besides the income, with more people occupied by the employment opportunities, the reduces the levels of idleness which are key to driving people into criminal acts which include joining rebel movements, demonstrations, riots, strikes, theft, robbery, murder and kidnapping. These create insecurity, injustice and directly affects the peace of masses. Therefore, with engaging people in opportunities, so shall be stopped.

In the long run, the operations of AfiCom Resilience Group shall therefore create stability and sustainable futures which are a key to economic prosperity and development of strong Institutions and states, which is of Global advantage if scaled Worldwide.

Currently, AfiCom Resilience Group has trained, mentored and supported twenty(20) Entrepreneurs who are engaged in different activities mainly in the Agricultural and Industrial sectors. These have been able to create about eighty five(85) employment opportunities for their fellows which have attributed to the improvement of their lifestyles and standards of living. These have been induced to the AfiCom savings network which has increased our Credit power. 

In the next one year period, due to the introduction of the AfiCom Mobile App, we want to grow our network to five thousand(5,000) Entrepreneurs whom we shall support to create about forty five thousand (45,000) opportunities of good jobs for employees that shall be subscribed too to our network. The employees are subscribed to our network in order to ensure fair wages and salaries such that they are not vulnerably employed as well as to continue saving with us which increases our Credit power for training and supporting other new Entrepreneurs. 

With good structures and results obtained from the above, in the next five years, we want to grow our network to about three million(3,000,000) Entrepreneurs who shall catapulted to create about twelve million(18,000,000) opportunities of good jobs and employment to other individuals.

As AfiCom Resilience Group through our initiative of AfiCom Mobile, by the end of our first financial year, next year in June, we aim to be a trusted brand within our triangle of operation that is to say in Uganda, South Sudan, Democratic Republic of Congo, Rwanda and Burundi. We want to build a strong team of trainees that is ready to change the lives of many people especially the youths, those in refugee settlements through our services such as extension sessions of training, Business Oriented Learning Resources on our Mobile application, Connection and Chatting via our platform, Credit and finance resources, Savings without necessitating to travel to a Commercial Institution and other advisory services through connecting to experts via our Website. With our target to reach five thousand entrepreneurs as the test base and forty five thousand employees, this shall be a tool that shall measure our progress after the first year of our project implementation with AfiCom Mobile App.

Within
the next five years, we aim to have developed an AfiCom Leadership Centre in
South Sudan which shall act as our broadcast and training base for all
Entrepreneurs and Leaders. This shall be aimed at accelerating and increasing
our efficiency of operations. We also aim at being the leading developed and
reliable multi-service provider having a one stop point for all the business
needs and survival. This shall reduce disruptions among the forthcoming
Entrepreneurs and also create a protection for the employees through the
bonuses added on their salary savings.

The main challenges that are stopping us from moving mountains are; inadequate finance, most of the financing has been from my salary and the rotation basis of the repayments from the network that am growing since I offer credit finance with low interest rates to catapult the Entrepreneurs. The second challenge are the high costs incurred in renting and hiring incentives such as housing where my services are based, in our cassava project, hiring vehicles that transport of produce and warehouses to store the products, these have taken a big proportion of our revenue. The third challenge is in Organising extensions and training sessions, this requires a lot of financing to hire a place or reception, tents and public address systems, Such are very costly given our low revenue and when it comes to recruiting more people especially in our savings network to grow our finances, they claim that we are not yet fully branded and there is no reason to trust us. But it all starts with enough finances to fully brand ourselves in advertisements to attract public interest, Organising more and more Campaigns and extensions, Partnering with other Organizations that are on the same cause.

Staffing has also somehow become a challenge for example when it comes to the Professionals such as Lawyers and Counsels for Legal activities, since we don't have enough to pay them for their services, it oftenly backslides our services. Softwares also requires payment for licenses which is also a great challenge for efficiency.

As AfiCom Resilience Group, we are addressing the challenge of finance through encouraging our entrepreneurs to enroll their employees too into the network as a platform where they shall be receiving their salaries and wages, in this we also encourage the employees to maintain them in savings to receive bonus interests over a given period of time, this helps us to manage our finances but for the aim of increasing our impact, we are requesting for financial aid from Donor Organizations, carrying out fundraising sessions, requesting for donations from people of that are willing to create impact in other people's lives. Anyone willing to donate can email us on aficom.r.g@gmail.com for details. Besides that, when we also expand our network we believe that the Network shall be able to sustain itself. For the case of renting and hiring, through what is obtained from the donations and funds raised, we plan to purchase land and construct our head offices of Management, Construct a Warehouse and Manufacturing center for our produce from the Entrepreneurial projects and Purchase our own delivery and distribution vehicles. This shall increase our efficiency and productivity and create more employment opportunities. We also look forward to have our own equipment such as tents, public address systems and transportation that are used in our open Campaigns.

Through Collaboration with Legal Institutions and other mutual goal aimed organizations such as Innovation Labs, we hope to cover the loopholes in Legal services.

We partner with Futures with Light to extend the knowledge to Secondary School Students, We Are Youths to advocate in the slum areas and far to reach areas, Innovation Labs to increase innovative solutions in agriculture and industry.

Since we are an Integrated Organization, our path to financial sustainability shall include; Donations and grants, raising investment capital through open campaigns and fundraising sessions, charges from services for example interest rates from the Credit section, Blockchain services such as processing and manufacturing, marketing and selling of products and inputs.

We hope that in the Long run, the system shall be able to support itself after this primary stage which is the most difficult.

The first source of funding which ignited everything was from my monthly salary while I was still working as a Supervisor with Mogas. This is the cause of all the functionality of this Project even though I did not earn much but it impacted many. I would have thought of other luxurious items but since I loved to cause an impact and create an opportunity for my fellow youths, I disregarded all the luxurious life. I used to earn about One hundred and fifty (120) dollars per month and with this I was able to create an opportunity for twenty entrepreneurs in Agriculture and Industry who created about eighty five job opportunities for fellow youths.

The second source of revenue has been from the rotation savings of the employees of the Entrepreneurs, I have always advised them to make savings with my savings group such that they can get bonuses over a given period of time which is often segmented in six months period. This is used to extend more credit facilities to other youths.

I have also received some donations from people especially after my impactful presentation which do not leave them behind.

I have never received anymore than that and this is why I come out to Solve to be catapulted such that I can move for the global impact. 

I seek any one who is willing to make impact on the lives of others especially those that do not have an opportunity like you.  As President of AfiCom Resilience Group, I have believed that one by one makes a bundle and you do not know what the future holds. I began AfiCom with my monthly salary and training sessions helping fellow youths, and now they have been able to move mountains. Therefore if you have either one dollar, two, three or a hundred or a thousand or a million that you would like to give to support my fellow youths, you never know they may be the ones to even support you in turn indirectly. Please reach out to me, you can send the money via swift codes to Uganda, or use pay-pal. Please just reach out to me on my email, aaronmsb29@gmail.com/ aaronmsb29@hotmail.com or the email for the Organization aficom.r.g@gmail.com , or Whats App +256701706694.

For those that prefer to use the bank, the details are here below;

Beneficiary Bank: ABSA Bank Uganda Limited , Swift Address: BARCUGKX , 

For US Dollar Transfers

Correspondent Bank: CITIBANK NEWYORK 

SWIFT ADDRESS: CITIUS33 

ABA ROUTING NUMBER: 021000089

ACCOUNT TITLE: MASUBA AARON

ACCOUNT NUMBER: 6006412333

Any one with a grant, please reach out to us. My PayPal email address is aaronmsb29@gmail.com.

Those offering Equity, please reach out to us on the above contacts. We accept any relevant material items too.

There is a lot to do and all starts with us collectively.

Our Budget for this financial year is about US Dollars, Seven hundred fifty thousand (US $ 750,000) with our aim of building our network to five thousand (5000) youth Entrepreneurs and creating forty five job opportunities to other youths. This is because many youths have lost their previous jobs due to the Corona Virus situation, therefore we aim to make a drastic impact to such individuals, the emphasis is placed also in reducing the costs incurred as a result of implicit and explicit costs. We want to set up our Headquarter offices which shall reduce the costs incurred in renting and hiring. Since our projects that we engage the young youth Entrepreneurs are mainly Agricultural and Industrial, we take the biggest role to see that they are a success and therefore we plan to also obtain three transport and delivery trucks of for the products to reduce the costs incurred in hiring the trucks and drivers. We also want to acquire our own tents, public address system to increase our advocacy levels and three(2) Staff vehicles to break the barrier of arbitrage especially on Organizational duties which involve travelling long distances like from one country to another.

We accept any support inform of anything because a lot has to be done and it begins now. Whether inform of trucks, vehicles that can simplify our activities, we are very thankful because this shall help reduce the budget expenses which we can not afford.

I am applying to the Elevate Prize in order to be catapulted. I am in need of funds to run efficiently, I want to get the connections such that I can be able to receive and gain access to resources that can help me move mountains in the Organization of AfiCom Resilience Group. I also want to get access to partners and those that can hold equity with my organization, those that can partner and those that are willing to donate and support our activities in any way.

I want to gain public confidence through being part of the Great team that made it Elevate prize, This shall improve my portfolio that AfiCom Resilience Group is moving boundaries across the World. In developing countries where our operations are running currently, People lack confidence in their own fellows, but if we receive nomination at the Elevate  Prize, it shall truly create confidence in the general public since we are looking forward to scale our operations.

We want to be known Worldwide that AfiCom is elevating humanity through it's activities. We want to be displayed to the entire World such that we are also open to Donors Internationally.

There is much to be done and we believe it will all become greater at the Elevate Prize Platform.

Since we are just developing and trying to get ourselves out of the nutshells, we want partners that can strengthen and improve our technology such that it can not be easily cracked since we deal with very delicate section. With the Support of the MIT Software engineering Department, we hope that we shall be able to have the strongest Technology. Anyone willing from MIT please reachout to us on this email aficom.r.g@gmail.com, we shall be honoured.

We also call upon advisors that can provide intellectual knowledge such that we can develop and catch up with International standards. These are welcomed to Board Members and advisors and those willing can email me on aaronmsb29@hotmail.com, we shall be very graced.

All funders are welcomed and those that can expose us to the entire World through media and marketing, we shall be very grateful and many more as outlined above.

We would like to partner with Organizations that are of mutual interest but most importantly, it shall be an honor to partner with the following Organizations;

• Elevate Prize
• Solve MIT
• World Bank
• Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
• USAID
• UKAID
• United Nations (UN)
• Ford Foundation
• Novo Nordisk Foundation
• Stichting INGKA Foundation
• The Rockefeller Foundation
• Walton Family Foundation
• Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation
• World Vision
• United Way
• Direct Relief
• American Humane
• W.K. Kellogg Foundation
• The Kresge Foundation
• Rotary Foundation
• MacArthur Foundation
• Tides Foundation
• New York Community Trust
• American Express Foundation
• Monsanto Fund
• Allen Foundation Inc.
• The Coca-Cola Foundation
• MTV Staying Alive Foundation
• The Zayed Future Energy Prize
• Charles Steward Mott Foundation
• CISCO Global Impact Crash Grant
• Hult Prize
• The ReSource Award for Sustainable Watershed Management
• Microsoft corporation.
• Patrick J McGovern Foundation.

All that i may not have mentioned but are willing to create an opportunity for the youth, we shall be greatly honored to have you.