Inception

Village Network Africa (ViNA) began in May 2007 with a vision to assist those suffering from abject poverty in rural villages within Africa. Through the work of a Ugandan Missionary in Uganda, Drs. Anita and Eugene Boling of Claremont, California, provided financial support to improve village conditions.

After Eugene’s untimely death, Anita decided to continue the couple’s support of healing the poverty of villagers in Africa.

Anita and two personal friends travelled to Uganda in August 2007. The team documented the poor state of housing, access and quality of healthcare, water, sanitation, agriculture, and animal husbandry in rural Uganda. The appalling living and social conditions inspired Anita to create a formal avenue of assistance for villages that had never before received outside aid. As a result, Village Network Africa (ViNA) was formed shortly thereafter as a public non-profit organization.

Getting Underway

Anita’s presentation about the effects of poverty in Uganda and her proposed action plan generated significant interest and support from many talented individuals in the fields of education, nursing, medicine, business, engineering and communications.

A needs assessment of the target villages was conducted in August 2008. Through various focus groups and interviews, ViNA collaborated with the local community to determine priority areas for assistance. ViNA now holds meetings with the advisory board on a quarterly basis.

Move to Tanzania

After sustainable development in Uganda in the areas of health, education, and agriculture/animal husbandry, the ViNA trustees decided to move operations to Tanzania in 2010. Our contact was through John Tulac’s connection with the Sisters of Notre Dame in Njiro, Tanzania.