Jackline Birungi knew the problem before she ever thought of building a social enterprise around it. Severe menstrual pain had affected her own education. She struggled to sit through class. She searched for relief and ended up taking too many painkillers.
Then, while going through the SINA Framework at Jangu International, something shifted. Instead of seeing this only as something painful that had happened to her, Jackline was challenged to ask a different question: Could the problem itself become an opportunity? That question eventually became She Deserves Uganda.
The first idea was a warming belt. It was too expensive for the girls they wanted to reach. So they dropped it. Jackline and her team went back to the girls and asked what they actually needed. Something affordable. Non-invasive. Something that could work quickly. They experimented again and developed a natural cramp-relief oil. Then around 100 products from the first batch sold in a single day. There was demand and there was still much more to figure out.
She Deserves has since continued working on menstrual pain, menstrual health information and the stigma surrounding periods. Jackline also deliberately brings boys into the conversation. They are brothers, classmates and future fathers. Menstruation should not remain something they know nothing about.
In 2024, Jackline was selected as an Anzisha Fellow, joining some of Africa’s youngest entrepreneurs in a two-year journey of growing themselves and their ventures. She has now reached the end of that fellowship, and Anzisha returned to Uganda to capture her story in this documentary.
Jackline is far from the only SINA entrepreneur to have gone through Anzisha. Over the years, 12 young social entrepreneurs emerging from SINA Communities have been selected as Anzisha Fellows. Four joined the fellowship in 2026 alone.
That relationship has grown over time. After repeatedly encountering young entrepreneurs coming out of SINA, Anzisha started looking more closely at what was happening behind them. In 2024, they published a case study on the SINA approach, invited SINA to present at the African Leadership Festival and today SINA is an important referral partner for young social entrepreneurs entering the Anzisha ecosystem.
For us, that matters. The aim is not to produce people who become good at applying for fellowships. It is to create an environment where young people who have often been denied opportunities can discover what they are capable of, take responsibility and turn the problems around them into social enterprises. Recognition can come later.
Jackline puts the more important part simply in the video: “I believe in what I’m doing and I believe my project is addressing the actual problem that people are facing in the community.”
Her story starts at 7:06 in the Anzisha documentary A Stigma of Presence: