When Denis Naigede returned to Uganda from Sweden in 2021, he did not return with the money he had expected. He returned with something else.
“I didn’t come back with money, but I came back with knowledge and some good experience,” he says.
That experience would later become the foundation for a business journey spanning international internship placements, skills development and, ultimately, a Shs1 billion investment in a young agricultural and vocational training institution in Jinja.
Naigede, born in 1990, grew up in Kamuli as the firstborn of eight boys. His father died in 2000, leaving his mother to raise the family.
His education was shaped by financial hardship. A sponsor affiliated with the Christian sector in the United Kingdom partly supported his primary school tuition, but the support ended after the sponsor went bankrupt.
Naigede returned to the village, where he worked for different people while pursuing his education. He eventually completed Senior Four before joining a technical institute, where he pursued a craft certificate.
His early working life took him to Kampala, where he worked for several organisations, including Knight Frank Uganda, with assignments at different facilities and malls.
Around 2016, he returned to university. His education later took him to Sweden for an 18-month internship, an experience that changed how he viewed work, agriculture and skills.
Before BAVI, there was Skillsway. Naigede says he began helping people access international opportunities informally around 2018 before Skillsway Agency Limited was fully incorporated in 2020.
The business focused on connecting students and skilled workers with internship opportunities abroad, with particular attention to agriculture and trades such as electrical work, plumbing and construction.
Since 2021, he says, Skillsway has helped secure placements and visas for approximately 500 to 600 people. Some have returned to Uganda and established small enterprises after completing their internships.
For Naigede, the experience exposed a gap he believed Uganda needed to address. Agriculture, in his view, was being approached largely as an academic subject rather than as a commercial skill. That belief was also personal.
“I come from a family of eight boys where all of us have done agriculture and studied agriculture-related courses,” he says. “Agriculture has been the backbone of our family.”
He grew up on a family farm, taking care of animals and participating in farming. His brothers also pursued agriculture-related paths, with Naigede saying all of them eventually secured opportunities to live and work abroad.
The experience shaped his conviction that agriculture should be presented to young people differently.
“Being a farmer is being a loser,” he says, describing the perception he wants to challenge.
His argument is that farming should be viewed as an enterprise capable of generating income and employment rather than as a fallback for people who fail to secure formal jobs.
That philosophy eventually led to Busoga Agricultural & Vocational Institute, or BAVI.
BAVI was incorporated in 2024 and began operations in 2025. The institute offers agriculture and vocational training, including National Diploma programmes in Animal Production, Crop Production and Agri-Business, alongside National Certificate programmes in ICT, Cosmetology and Agriculture.
The institution’s profile places practical training at the centre of its model, with workshops, ICT and science laboratories, agricultural facilities and demonstration farms designed to give students hands-on experience.
Naigede says BAVI currently has about 85 students and approximately 25 academic and support staff. He estimates the investment in establishing and developing the institution at about Shs1 billion.
Most of the money, he says, has come from his personal savings generated through his other businesses. BAVI currently has no external funding or government support, according to Naigede, although he says other shareholders are expected to contribute.
For a young institution with relatively low enrolment, the financial pressure is significant.
“Running an institution is so demanding,” he says. “The numbers or the enrolments are still very low.”
The challenge is not limited to construction. Salaries, operating costs and practical projects continue to require investment, while Naigede says the institution is still building its student base.
Yet he remains committed to a model built around practical skills.
“We focus on skilling than actually equipping with so much knowledge,” he says.
His criticism of conventional education is centered on what he sees as an imbalance between theory and practical application.
Through BAVI, he wants students to leave with something they know how to do, rather than only information they have learned.
The model extends into entrepreneurship. Naigede says students are expected to establish personal projects before graduation, with the institution following up and providing guidance.
For him, the measure of education should ultimately include what a graduate is able to produce.
“You should have some trade or trade skills,” he says. “Some of these practical skills or vocational skills can actually give you or earn you a living before you start looking for jobs.”
BAVI’s agricultural focus is also linked to Naigede’s belief that Uganda’s young population needs more practical ways to participate in the economy.
He points to technologies such as hydroponics as examples of how agriculture can be practised with limited space. The idea, he says, is to show young people that farming does not necessarily require large pieces of land.
The institute also uses international exposure as part of its approach. BAVI offers an 18-month agricultural exchange programme in Denmark, where eligible students gain practical experience on commercial farms.
The institution’s profile says the programme provides exposure to modern farming practices and professional work environments.
Naigede sees the programme as a way of addressing what he considers one of agriculture’s biggest obstacles in Uganda: mindset.
Students, he says, should see how farming is organised in countries where agriculture operates as a sophisticated commercial industry.
They return with new skills, a different perspective and, according to his explanation of the model, some capital to put into their own enterprises.
The Denmark programme therefore fits into a larger strategy. Naigede is trying to connect education, international exposure and enterprise rather than treating graduation as the final destination.
His ambitions extend well beyond BAVI’s current size.
Over the next 10 to 15 years, he wants the institution to become what he describes as Uganda’s first and leading agriculture university.
For now, though, the institution is still in its early stages, and the immediate challenge is proving the model.
Naigede’s story gives him a personal reason to persist.
He grew up in a household where resources were limited. He worked his way through education. He travelled abroad expecting financial success and returned with knowledge instead.
He then turned that knowledge into a business that he says has helped hundreds of young people access international internship opportunities.
Now he is putting his own savings into an institution built around the same principle that shaped his life: skills should create opportunities.
“I cannot say I’ve made it yet,” he says. “But guess what? I see where I’m going. I know what I want to achieve.”
For Naigede, the next stage is therefore less about proving that he has succeeded and more about building the institution he believes Uganda’s skills economy needs.
His advice to young people is rooted in a lesson from one of his university lecturers: be SMART.
“Be specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time-bound,” he recalls.
The principle fits the ambition he has set for BAVI. A young institution. A Shs1 billion personal investment. A business model built around practical skills. And a long-term plan to turn an agricultural training institute in Jinja into a university.
For now, Naigede is building toward that goal one student, one project and one investment at a time.
