From Food Science to Finance | Katamba Matthew Kenneth's Story

If you think the vicious cycle of poverty is just a phrase, let me tell you a small story.

Picture this: a father, bent over a bicycle, repairing punctured tires under the burning sun. A mother bent over a garden patch no bigger than a king-sized bed. And six children waiting to eat… from whatever that day brings.

One of those children was my childhood friend, Sam. We were dreamers—little boys playing careers after school. To Sam, an engineer; and I, a doctor. We laughed, we dreamed, we saw no limits.

But dreams need fuel. And while I went home to a meal that gave me strength, Sam went home to a plate that left him weak. Malnutrition slowed him in body and in mind.

Eventually, his parents made what they thought was a rational choice: to "save money" by pulling him out of school. That choice ended his dream.

Today, at 30, Sam is a boda rider with six children of his own. And unless something changes, his children risk inheriting the same fate.

This is not failure. It is survival. But survival repeated across generations… that is the true face of poverty, which often begets poverty.

And it is this reality that first shaped my calling.

The Lab Coat Years

As a food science student, the story was simple—poverty followed from a lack of food, a tidy chain of cause and effect. I believed the solution was clear: fight poverty by fighting hunger.

My classmates and I saw ourselves in the villages, teaching nutrition, advocating for food safety, ensuring farmers' harvests didn't rot before reaching markets.

We were idealists in white lab coats, feeling smart all day with our carefully crafted experiments, only to realize that outside, life was messy, hungry, and unforgiving.

But the more I looked, the more I realized: food was not the full story. Uganda is endowed with affordable, nutrient-packed foods. The problem was not lack of food. The problem was access and lack of income. Families could not eat because money was missing from their pockets.

I began to understand that the root of the cycle was financial capital—or rather, the lack of it.

My intuition was clear: if I wanted to change lives, I needed to pivot. I needed to understand capital—how to attract it, preserve it, and deploy it efficiently.

That's when I put aside the lab coat and picked up the calculator.

Learning the Language of Capital

My story began again at PwC Uganda—in audit rooms stacked with files and deadlines. I was a young accountant, learning discipline, rigor, and how to ask uncomfortable questions. There, numbers felt abstract—lines on a page that supposedly told the story of an organization's health, its risks, its survival, and its promises made and broken—but somehow remained distant, disconnected from real lives.

Through COVID's chaos and sleepless nights, I chased the ACCA charter. I nearly broke, I nearly quit—yet I rose and stood as Uganda's Best ACCA Affiliate. It wasn't just an award—it was proof I was worthy of a new responsibility: the stewardship of capital, and that I belonged.

And I didn't stop there. In order to develop my strategic acumen, widen my lens beyond accounting, I invested further—earning an MBA and industry-recognized certifications. Not just to collect titles, but to build the confidence to say, "I am ready to make change—however small."

Finally, the qualifications I had worked so hard for opened doors—doors into rooms where important decisions were being made as a corporate finance and treasury manager in a medium-sized company.

The Human Story Behind the Numbers

On paper, my role was simple: crunch the numbers into neat reports, help the EXCO make quick, financially sound decisions.

But here's the truth—I was operating in a silo. As a steward, I had only ever looked at numbers from one angle: protecting shareholder interests. In boardrooms, we used polished phrases like "cost optimization," "operational efficiency," "rightsizing." Words that sounded smart on slides… but outside those rooms, they meant something much harsher.

They meant a hardworking father, on an unfortunate day, walking home, laid off, having lost himself—"palms are sweaty, knees weak, arms are heavy"—breaking the news to his wife. Now left with nothing but the pocket change from fixing punctured bicycle tires under the scorching sun. Rent going unpaid, a family at risk of being evicted, and a mother pacing the kitchen, rationing a single meal across six children, her hands trembling with stress. They meant a child—like Sam—lying awake, stomach empty, dreams slipping away in the dark, stolen once again by circumstances beyond his control. But by that same old nemesis: the vicious cycle of poverty and malnutrition.

Suddenly, the numbers were no longer abstract. They had faces, voices, and weight to them. They didn't merely tell a financial story—they told a human story.

The Spreadsheet I'll Never Forget

Then came the spreadsheet I will never forget. My proving ground. Another exercise to optimize costs—I could now clearly see underneath the "corporate lingo."

I built a cashflow model that didn't just expose the truth—it pointed to a solution: restructure the company's debts, reduce costs, and free up some cash in efforts to keep 63 families on payroll. That meant children could stay in school, and families could eat with dignity.

For me, it was no longer about "closing the books."

It was about keeping businesses alive while protecting livelihoods and breaking, in my own small way, that vicious cycle.

Where I Stand Today

Today, I work at a top bank under Corporate and Investment Banking. I structure deals that enable Pan-African champions and global companies to thrive in Uganda's untapped market. As a Non-Executive Director at ZakomTech, I help nurture small ideas into sustainable enterprises.

But my story is not yet complete, for I believe that if we also champion financial literacy among our youth, we shall preserve wealth across generations. We can finally break the cycle that so many families have been enslaved to for decades.

I foresee a community where financial growth and social impact coexist—where businesses thrive without sacrificing families, and where investment creates opportunity, not desperation. Where capital always meets its intended purpose. Where one person, one family, one marginalized community at a time, can break free from poverty because capital reached them.

The Human Story

This is why I cherish what I do every day. Because at the end of the day, I no longer just think balance sheets or abstract numbers.

I think about Sam. And I think about his children—who, if we get this right, will get to keep hope alive, not becoming pawns to the cycle.

And with every decision, every deal, every investment I structure, I carry with me the human story.

Because every financial number also tells a human story.

One day, I want to stand on a podium with my team and say, with pride:

We unlocked capital in our society.

We are preserving it.

And we transformed livelihoods—one person, one family, one community at a time.