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World Food Day, seen from a small island in Lake Victoria
16 October 2026
From Takawiri you can see the mainland on a clear morning. The crossing is short, but for the families who live here it decides a lot: what reaches the market, what it costs, and how far you travel when someone is sick.
Most households live from two things, the lake and a small plot of land. When the fish catch is poor, the plot has to carry the family. When the rains fail, the lake has to. On many days neither is enough, and the cheapest food wins over the most nourishing.
That is the reality behind today, World Food Day.
A global day with a local meaning
World Food Day is marked every 16 October, the day the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) was founded in 1945. Today people in nearly 150 countries take part, from hunger marches to school gardens, to call attention to hunger and to the right of everyone to healthy food.
This year's theme is "Innovate today. Nourish tomorrow." FAO's message is that forward-thinking solutions, combined with traditional knowledge and inclusive approaches, can help make sure everyone has enough diverse, safe and nutritious food, while protecting the planet for the generations after us.
On Takawiri, that sentence describes our plan quite precisely. The traditional knowledge is already here, in the women who have farmed this soil for generations. The innovation is often small and practical: compost instead of bought fertiliser, a drip line for the dry months, a phone to record what grows and what fails. And inclusive means that the people who farm are also the people who decide.
Takawiri Island is not a theoretical project. It is a real place, with real people. And Ongata Foundation exists for one reason above all others: to serve this community in the best way we possibly can, with solutions that come from the island itself.
Where food and medicine meet
Lineya Belinda Oluoch, our Director of Programmes and Partnerships, is a registered clinical officer at Siaya County Referral Hospital. She sees the link between food and health every working day.
"Patients come back for their HIV medication every month. The question we don't ask often enough is whether they have eaten. Treatment is hard to keep up on an empty stomach. Food is not an extra. It is part of the care."
In Homa Bay County, more than 130,000 people were on HIV treatment in 2023. On an island where the clinic, the market and the bank are all a boat ride away, that number is not a statistic. It is neighbours, cousins and friends.
Why we start with women and soil
Purity Ambani Chibolo leads the Ongata Foundation Farm. Her focus is simple: women farmers, healthy soil and water they can rely on.
"The women already do most of the farming here. What they lack is good seed, a little water in the dry months, and a fair price. Give them that, and the whole household eats better."
The farm we are building is small on purpose: bio-intensive beds, compost instead of bought fertiliser, crops chosen for nutrition as much as for sale, and irrigation planned for the dry season. Part of the harvest is meant for neighbours living with HIV and other conditions that weaken the immune system. Our 4-acre farm figures are a scenario, not results. You can test them in our Farm Impact Simulator.
Built from within the community
Ongata Foundation is not built as a short-term intervention. We are a young organisation, our NGO registration is in progress, and we would rather say that plainly than dress it up. What we are building is a long-term, locally anchored system, led by people who live here and answer to their neighbours. Everything we learn, including what doesn't work, will be shared openly at Our Project & Funding page.
"We are not waiting for someone to come and fix the island for us," says our Chairperson, Michael Onyango Ongata. "Our first duty is to the people of Takawiri. We want to show what an island community can do for itself, with the right partners beside it."
If you work on food, health or farming around Lake Victoria, we would like to hear from you: info@ongatafoundation.org.
If you want to know more about World Food Day and this year's theme: Read more on FAO's World Food Day site — https://www.fao.org/world-food-day/en
Sources: FAO World Food Day; WHO, Nutrient requirements for people living with HIV/AIDS; Homa Bay County Statistical Abstract 2024, Table 1.4.16 (KNBS).
Ongata Foundation
Official establishment of Ongata Foundation March 2026 by the Ongata's family grave.
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