I am Lunkuse sandrah a born of 01st/09/1996 to Mr.sembatya Patrick and Mrs. Sembatya Harriet in Wakiso District. I am the 3rd born of five children. I grew up in Kampala in Makindye division under the care of my two parents. My dad runs factory dealing in agricultural products while my mom is a dedicated house wife and runs a family farm in Entebbe
I started school at 4years and attended primary school at Winston Standard Academy Kampala where I did my primary leaving exams from in 2008. During my early primary level since we would studying half day, I would help my mom with the farm work which involved feeding and providing water to the pigs and crop work. This exposed to me to farming at an early age and hence started inspiring my love for agriculture.
Apart from agriculture, I also developed a love for music and dancing at an early age. This was because my school organized music festivals during which professional musician would come and perform, motivate and career guide us. We also had school completions in music and dancing something that exposed my other hidden talents in music.
I later joined at kizito secondary school where I finalized my Ordinary level studies in 2012. During my vacation after O’level, I helped my dad in his factory and that exposed me to agro-based value addition. Here learnt how corn flour was processed at the milling plant which not only earned me some pocket money but further build my fascination in agriculture. In 2013, I joined Advance Level studies at Hilton high school in Mukono where I finished my secondary studies in 2014.
After secondary level, we had a long holiday off from school a time during which my dad considered my grown and able to work. He made me work with him at the milling to avoid idleness and build a working spirit in me. Here I was exposed to hard work at the milling plant. I was placed in charge of supervising worker and factory’s days’ target of flour bags milled were met by the workers. Sometimes my mom also requested my assistance with the farm in breeding, farm expansion and construction and handling the farm’s hands men.
All these exposures in agriculture shaped my passion for animal science and thus my commitment to agriculture industry.
In 2015, I attended a training at Entebbe farm.Here I was attached to Makerere University Agricultural research institute for internship and a hands-on training in dairy animal production where I learnt practical dairy cattle feeding, pasture preservation (hay, silage), blood sample collection, feed mixing, disease diagnosis, minor surgical operations, record keeping, housing management, and fencing among others. This lasted a period of 3 months.
I worked on our family farm in Entebbe and was in charge of animal nutrition, biosecurity, hiring and paying of farm workers, herd health management roles that greatly helped in boosting the production of our farm.
On the farm, reared a few cattle and pigs mostly, a lucrative niche in animal husbandry in Wakiso because of the high demand for pork and milk. The knowledge I attained during my trainings and internship enabled me improve the farms nutrition and milk production through animal feed conservation techniques, reduce piglet mortalities on the farm through provision of iron injection, creep feeding and biosecurity.
This farm experience allowed me to apply my practical skills and knowledge. During my free time, I would carry out field practices in my community by treating other peoples Animals and providing consultancy services in good ideas about farming something that earned me some extra cash.
I am currently doing extension work in the field of animal production in my countryside.