“Sometimes the smallest spark—in this case, a concern over cattle disease—ignites a revolution,” says Stellah Nakirijja, and in Uganda’s heartlands, she has lit that spark into a wildfire of change. Born in Nakaseke District, Stellah is an agricultural engineer with a vision so clear, so urgent, that it has the power to transform the continent’s livestock industry.
A scholar at Makerere University, she straddles worlds: pursuing a Bachelor’s in Business Administration while working within the Department of Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering. She knows the science behind irrigation and water systems intimately—and she also understands the heartbeat of the farmer’s plight. In regions where livestock means livelihood, a tiny disease-carrying tick can become a death knell for animals, families, and generations.
It was at the AYuTe Africa Challenge in October 2024 where her brilliance first caught national attention. Her solar-powered tick detector, a slender device harnessing the sun’s energy to identify and protect livestock, won the Women in Agribusiness category, earning UGX 3.5 million. Not just a trophy, this was a validation of an idea rooted in necessity and empathy. As Heifer International Uganda noted, agricultural innovation like Stellah’s breaks barriers in a sector struggling under inconsistent electricity and fragile supply chains.
Picture a cattle herder out on a dusty plain, solar detector in hand, scanning hides for invisible threats. That one scan prevents a tick infestation that could wipe out a herd. It isn’t a gimmick; it’s practical, low-cost, and life-saving. And because it’s solar-powered, it works when and where the grid doesn’t—rural Uganda’s reality.
What feels even more remarkable is that Stellah didn’t build this distant from the farmer. She built it for the farmer. In Nakaseke’s shade, she listened to their stories, cataloged their losses. She knew artificial insemination satellites and veterinary paraprofessionals were improving genetics and reproduction rates across Uganda—but she also knew that no cattle are safe if death comes in the form of silent parasites.
Uganda’s National Animal Genetic Resources Centre has rolled out trainings in AI and embryo transfer, but its ambition—captured in new robotic satellite centers—is only as strong as the health of the animals themselves. It is in this space that Stellah inserted her tool, bridging innovation and need, high-tech and humble cowboy.
Her detector didn’t emerge from a corporate incubator; it was forged in laboratories and heart-to-heart exchanges with pastoralists whose stories of loss echo across East Africa. She is not just an inventor: she is a translator of hope. Driven by her engineering training and business mindset, she is already positioning her work for scale—preparing to move from prototype to marketable product, just as Assumpta Nakalema did with her solar incubator.
Each award Stellah earns, each mention at Makerere or Heifer involves more than recognition—it offers fuel. She plans to refine the detector’s sensitivity, integrate it with mobile data so veterinarians can monitor outbreaks in real time, and collaborate with the livestock sector to mass-produce and distribute the device affordably. She imagines farmer cooperatives owning them, women pastoralists leading the training, and district officers using her data to prevent regional epidemics.
This is her dream: to make livestock protection as instinctive as a mother’s hug, to render the tick powerless in rural economies. She rejects the notion of rural innovation as quaint. Instead, she treats it as a national growth engine—one solar pulse at a time, shielding cattle and conserving livelihoods.
Stellah Nakirijja is not an engineer working in isolation; she is the shepherd of her people’s future. In a country where livestock contribute significantly to GDP, where female and youth farmers stake everything on their animals, her innovation is not optional—it is essential. She stands at the confluence of tradition and technology, channeling Makerere’s academic rigor into a tool that livestock farmers can trust with their herds.
Her story is the story of modern Uganda tech-born, sun-powered, farmer-rooted, and daring to protect the backbone of rural economies. And in that narrative lies the promise of a continent no longer threatened by tiny parasites, but empowered by African ingenuity, guided by women like Stellah Nakirijja, lighting the way forward.
