The informal sector employs 70% of Uganda’s labour force but the sector is largely underserved in terms of development services. The impact of HIV/AIDS on the informal sector activities, which are often family enterprises operated and/or owned by sole breadwinners, begins as soon as a family member starts to suffer from HIV-related illness.

This is compounded the fact that the workers have low incomes and poor health seeking behaviour. For example in the market communities, vendors spend over 15 hours everyday at their work place. Given the nature of their work and the dire need for survival, most of the vendors cannot take time off to access health services in poorly resourced health centers. DII’s experience shows that uptake of services increases significantly when the services are provided within the workplace