The short answer
A feasibility study tests whether a project should go ahead before real money is committed to it. A bankable one covers five sections: market (is there enough demand at a price that works), technical (can it actually be built and run), financial (does the cash math work, including the break-even point and the lean months), legal and regulatory (every licence and approval it needs), and environmental and social (whether a NEMA-approved project brief or full assessment is required). It ends with a plain go or no-go recommendation, not just a pile of data.
Banks, the Uganda Development Bank and most private investors will not put real money into a project on a business plan alone once the numbers get large: they ask for the study behind the numbers. What a study costs depends on the project size and how many of the five sections need original fieldwork rather than desk research, so treat any fixed figure quoted before your project is scoped with caution. See business-plan-writing-uganda for the document a feasibility study usually feeds into.
What a bankable feasibility study contains
Each section answers a different question, and a reader who has seen many of these can tell within a few pages which ones were actually researched and which were filled in to complete the document.
| Section | What it answers | What the reader looks for |
|---|---|---|
| Market | Is there enough demand at a price that works | Realistic demand numbers, not aspirational ones, and named competitors |
| Technical | Can it actually be built and run | Site, technology, suppliers, staffing and a realistic build timeline |
| Financial | Does the cash math work | Start-up cost, funding gap, break-even point and cash flow through the lean months |
| Legal and regulatory | What licences and approvals it needs | Every licence named, who issues it, and how long each one takes |
| Environmental and social | What impact assessment applies, if any | A NEMA-approved project brief or full assessment before work starts, for listed project types |
The environmental section is often skipped, and should not be
Projects listed in the National Environment Act 2019 schedules need a project brief or a full Environmental and Social Impact Assessment approved by the National Environment Management Authority (NEMA) before work starts, under the National Environment (Environmental and Social Assessment) Regulations 2020. That assessment is carried out by environmental practitioners registered with NEMA, not by a general business consultancy. Where a project we are studying is listed, we scope that requirement plainly and bring in a registered practitioner alongside our own work rather than skip it.
A filled outline, for a Ugandan project
Take a mid-size project, a 40-room budget hotel on the Jinja road, as a worked example of how the five sections get filled. The figures below are illustrative, to show what belongs in each section, not a real submission.
- Market: occupancy and average daily rate for the three nearest comparable hotels, a count of corporate and NGO travellers passing through the route, and a stated target occupancy for year one that is lower than the market average, not higher.
- Technical: the site, road access, power and water supply, the build specification, the contractor and a realistic 14 to 18 month build timeline, not the 9 months first quoted.
- Financial: total project cost, the owner equity portion, the loan being asked for, monthly cash flow for the first 24 months, and the month the property turns cash positive.
- Legal and regulatory: URSB company registration, a KCCA or municipal trading licence, a National Environment Management Authority screening, a tourism sector operating permit, and liquor and food handling licences if the hotel serves either.
- Environmental and social: whether the project size and location trigger a NEMA project brief, and if so, a scope and budget for a registered practitioner to complete it.
The study closes with a one-page go or no-go section: does the project clear the bank or investor's minimum return, at the occupancy the market section actually supports, once every licence in the legal section is paid for.
What a bank, UDB or investor checks
The Public Private Partnerships Unit at the Ministry of Finance requires a feasibility study and a value-for-money assessment before any project reaches the PPP Committee for approval, for projects structured as public-private partnerships. The Uganda Development Bank lends against agriculture, agro-industrialisation, manufacturing, tourism and minerals, and expects a bankable business plan and financial model behind any loan application of real size, not a plan alone.
Private investors and diaspora buyers ask the same three questions in different words: what proves the demand is real, what proves the project can be built for the stated cost, and what happens to their money if either assumption is wrong. A feasibility study is the document built to survive that questioning. See investment-consultancy-uganda for the wider market-entry picture, and use business-profit-calculator-uganda to sense-check your own margin before you commission a study.
What drives the cost, and what we deliver
Three things move the price of a feasibility study more than anything else: whether the market section needs an original survey or can be built from desk research, whether the environmental section triggers a NEMA assessment by a registered practitioner, and how many sites or technical options need comparing. A single-site retail project with an established market is a different job from a new agro-processing plant with no comparable operation in the country.
We quote a fixed price after seeing the project brief, never before, and the quote does not move once work starts. Payment runs 50% upfront, 25% at the draft, 25% on delivery, and you own the finished study and the data behind it. We are building our consultancy practice now: our proof is 37 live website and app builds delivered for clients, our own live products (Growth Informer Business, our cloud POS and business platform, Moyo Pay, our dual-currency wallet, and a loan and SACCO management system we build for lenders), and our registration with URA as a tax agent. We do not claim past feasibility-study clients or outcomes, because we have none yet to claim honestly.
What we do, and what we do not
We offer business consultancy, market entry support and investment facilitation. We do not give licensed investment advice on securities: that requires a Capital Markets Authority licence, which we do not hold and do not claim to hold. We do not give legal advice: where a project needs a legal opinion, we work alongside your advocate, not instead of one.
We never guarantee a licence, a tender, funding or a return, and any consultant who does should be treated with suspicion. What we commit to is the study itself: the five sections properly researched, the numbers stress-tested, and an honest go or no-go, even when no-go is the harder thing to deliver. For the business plan that often sits alongside a feasibility study, see business-plan-writing-uganda, and for a wider set of tested business ideas by capital level, see business-ideas-in-uganda.
Frequently asked questions
What is a feasibility study?
A document that tests whether a project should go ahead as designed, before money is committed to it. A bankable one covers market, technical, financial, legal and regulatory, and environmental and social feasibility, and ends with a go or no-go recommendation.
What does a feasibility study report look like?
It opens with an executive summary, then works through the five sections in turn, market, technical, financial, legal and regulatory, and environmental and social, with data and sources behind each claim, and closes with the go or no-go recommendation and its conditions.
Is there a feasibility study template I can use?
The five-section outline on this page functions as one. A bank or serious investor is checking whether your numbers hold up under questioning, not just whether the template is filled in, so the research behind each section matters more than the format.
What does a feasibility study cost in Uganda?
It depends on the project size and how many sections need original fieldwork rather than desk research. We quote a fixed price after seeing the project brief, never a figure before that, and the price does not move once work starts.
Can I see a feasibility study example?
See the filled outline on this page, a worked example for a Ugandan hotel project showing what belongs in each of the five sections. The figures there are illustrative, to show the format, not a real submission.