By Rhyman Agaba
Agricultural experts selected as trainers for this year’s Harvest Money Expo in Kampala have been assured by the organisers that they will get more time for their training sessions.
“For us in poultry, we use 40 minutes in the presentation and use 90 minutes to answer questions in the previous expos,” said poultry expert Robert Serwanga, who will train at the annual expo.
He said trainers during the much-anticipated three-day event need more time to properly tackle the topics they prepare.
The expo, in its seventh edition this year, is organised by multimedia company Vision Group.
This year’s edition will for a second successive time be held at Kololo Ceremonial Grounds in Kampala, with between 25,000 and 40,000 guests expected to attend.
Before then, the expo was held at Namboole Stadium but due to rehabilitation works at the sports facility, it was relocated to Kololo.
Like with previous editions, this year’s expo, which will run from February 10 to February 12, will be a blend of exhibitions and training sessions at the same venue.
On Friday, February 3, 2023, exactly a week to the expo, Vision Group (the organisers) met the trainers at the company’s head office in Industrial Area to brief them, during which the trainers also weighed in on a variety of matters.
Serwanga, for instance, argued that a great deal of their allocated time is usually spent on answering questions raised by the audience members, which eats into what they had planned to teach.
In response, Hellen Mukiibi, New Vision’s senior producer of news and current affairs, assured the trainers that unlike before, each trainer will this time around have about three hours to exhaust their prepared content.
‘Keep it simple’
Vision Group CEO Don Wanyama urged the agro-trainers to keep their presentations simple, saying the most important aspect of communication is simplicity.
“We should be able to communicate in a simple way,” he said, also assuring the facilitators of good attendance because the events management team is “doing all it takes to fill all the empty seats”.
Alice Kangave, who has been practising bee farming in Nakaseke since 1984, will be on the trainers cast.
She advised her fellow trainers to be considerate about the language they use to ensure that the majority understand what they are teaching and benefit from the training session.
During the expo days, the gates at Kololo will be open for public entry starting 8am until 6pm. The entrace fee is sh10,000 per day. To attend any of the trainings, you will pay an additional sh10,000 (that is sh20,000 in total per day).
This year, Vision Group has offered to train children free of charge.
The 2023 edition is themed ‘Farming as a business’.
