Layla Younis | Posted: Wednesday, November 13, 2013 12:00 am

Jacob Manyang remembers surviving the Second Sudanese Civil War by traveling from city to city, sleeping under trees and looking at stars in the middle of night, all before turning 10 years old.

Today, Manyang is a 26-year-old sophomore at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and is starting an organization to provide basic necessities to people in South Sudan.

“It’s hard to find food and things to survive,” Manyang said.

The Save South Sudanese Orphans and Widows student organization is trying to provide mosquito nets, clean water, general education and information on how to cultivate crops to people in South Sudan.

“Putting these three or four ideas together can help them,” Manyang said.

These things all interrelate with each other, Manyang said. For example, people can be educated on how to cultivate crops so they can make their own food.

Liang Xiang, a senior journalism major, wrote a story about Manyang for a class project.

“He just started this organization this August,” Xiang said. “They had maybe two or three meetings.”

Manyang is trying to collaborate with organizations such as Humanities and Medicine, an interdisciplinary program to educate students about social and cultural contexts of health, illness and medical care, to make his organization successful.

The goal of the organization is to raise enough money to be able to provide necessities, Manyang said.

There is no expected goal in how much money the organization will get.

Depending on the amount of money received, the organization will be able to buy 50 to 100 mosquito nets or travel to Sudan and develop better methods to provide safer water.

On Tuesday, the organization had a meeting to gather members.