Founder & Team Leader
Pastor Matilde Nono
She saw girls pushed out of school for want of fees, young mothers with no way to feed their children and widows left with little opportunity — and refused to accept that poverty should have the last word.
What began as acts of care grew into Nono Caring Hearts Foundation.
Poverty should not have the last word.
Pastor Matilde Nono
The woman
Compassion, and a practical belief in people.
Pastor Matilde Nono brings together two things that have shaped the organisation from the beginning: compassion for people, and a practical belief in their potential.
She believes dignity is not restored by telling people that they matter. It is also restored by creating opportunities for them to do, create, contribute and provide.
What she saw
Door-to-door in Namataba, Kirinya — and people who had not been able to bathe.
During door-to-door evangelism in Namataba, Kirinya, Pastor Matilde discovered a community full of vulnerable people — older men and women who had not been able to afford a bath in a long time.
She sat with them and asked how she could help. Most gave the same answer: they had no soap, and they could not afford food.
She saw girls pushed out of school because there were no fees. Young mothers with no way to feed their children. Widows left with very little opportunity. Not one story — a pattern, repeating across the same community.
Why she could not ignore it
A young mother might receive help today. What about tomorrow?
Pastor Matilde began to see the limits of relief. A girl might be given something to eat, but what would give her the ability to provide for herself? A widow might need support, but what if she could learn a skill that created an income?
These questions changed the way she thought about helping people. The answer could not always be another handout. Sometimes, it had to be a hand up.
Where the idea came from
A youth camp, a lesson in soap making — and an answer to what she had seen.
Not long after, Pastor Matilde attended a youth camp where people were being trained in soap making. The connection was immediate: here was a practical skill that could give people exactly what they lacked — soap to wash with, and something they could make and sell.
She picked up the idea and gathered some of the young people who had received the soap-making training, and began working with them to make liquid soap.
What began as acts of care — for one person, then another — was growing into something more organised.
From care to empowerment
When the first team could not be relied on, she built something that could.
The first attempt was hard. Many of the young people she had gathered were unfaithful and unserious, and the work could not depend on them.
That is when Pastor Matilde decided to open the production centre herself — and to train and employ other young women and single mothers to make soap and other products, equipping them with business skills so that they too could start their own enterprises and improve their livelihoods.
The work was deliberately practical. People were not simply taught. They were encouraged to make, produce, serve customers, take orders and discover what they could do with their own hands.
From giving to equipping
We do not only give. We equip.
When someone learns how to create something valuable, they gain more than a skill. They gain confidence, dignity and another possibility for their future.
That distinction is the philosophy behind everything the foundation does today.
The social enterprise
The production centre became the classroom.
The production centre Pastor Matilde opened became the practical environment where skills meet the real world. Products have to be made. Customers have to be served. Quality matters. Orders have to be delivered. Costs have to be understood.
Young women and single mothers were not only trained to make soap — they were equipped with business skills, so that they too could start their own enterprises and improve their livelihoods.
For Matilde, that is part of the training — and eventually, a person learns how to turn a skill into a livelihood.
The vision for Kirinya
A place where someone arrives uncertain and leaves with a pathway.
She wants to create a place where a young woman can arrive with uncertainty and leave with a skill, confidence, experience and a pathway to income — a place where she discovers she is not defined by where she started.
The Nono Skilling & Empowerment Centre at Kirinya brings training, production and enterprise incubation onto one site, so skilling capacity and earned income can grow together.
The future
Learn a skill. Put it to work. Open a door for someone else.
The vision is bigger than one person, one product or one training programme. It is about building a pathway: learn a skill, put it to work, earn an income, build a livelihood, create opportunity for someone else.
A future where fewer people are defined by what they lack, and more people are equipped to build what comes next.
There was a point when helping one person at a time was no longer enough.
How the work evolved
Care → Equip → Train → Produce → Earn → Build
Each stage grew out of the limits of the one before it.
- 01
Care
Meeting people where they are
- 02
Equip
Skills instead of dependence
- 03
Train
Market-relevant programmes
- 04
Produce
Real batches, real standards
- 05
Earn
Income in her own hands
- 06
Build
A permanent centre at Kirinya
The vision
A permanent home for the work
The Kirinya Skilling & Empowerment Centre brings training, production and enterprise incubation onto one site, so skilling capacity and earned income can grow together.
Stand with the next chapter
Nono Caring Hearts is building a place where women build their futures. You can fund a phase, equip a workshop, sponsor a trainee or give in kind.
And behind that contribution is a person who gets another chance to learn, create, work and move forward.
Build with us. Help build the next chapter.