SNV started its work in Uganda in 1989 as a funding and implementing agency, executing projects and programs. With time, SNV evolved to engage in demand oriented advisory work with local organisations. In late 2002 and early 2003, advisory services were decentralised to regional offices called Portfolios meaning a team of advisors based in a geographic location, serving clients and partners responding to the strategic needs of these clients and partners on a demand driven basis.
Working within portfolios, our work in advisory services is a unique and carefully positioned combination of capacity development and thematic expertise: we support meso level organizations which require specialized knowledge in order to accomplish their goals, but may not be able to acquire it commercially.
While we work at the meso level, we ourselves are situated between thousands of organizations worldwide, encouraging complementarities between organizations, helping other NGOs and CSOs to more effectively combat poverty, and bridging the gaps between civil society, government, and the private sector in those places where such discontinuities exist. SNV also coordinates the work of public-private partnerships, a structural model combining the disparate but complementary competencies of the private sector, civil society, and government. We do not focus on any one class of actor; we are equally willing to work with the public and private sectors as well as other NGOs.
SNV goals align with the framework of the United Nations’ Millennium Development Goals, or MDGs. SNV Uganda focuses on two impact areas to help achieve poverty reduction and improve governance.