1. “Sustainability through Participation, Empowerment and
Decentralization II” (SPED II 2006-2009),
Jointly
funded by Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) and SAFP, the
SPED II program (2006 – 2009) follows the successful completion of the
earlier SPED program (2003 to 2006). SPED stands for ‘Sustainability
through Participation, Empowerment and Decentralization’, which represents
the development philosophy that shapes these programs. The current SPED II
program is in partnership with 48 Diocesan Social Service Societies (DSSSs),
three non-diocesan service organizations, and approximately 52,000
grassroots community-based organizations known as Sanghams or Self Help
Groups (SHGs) in 116 villages in the Indian states of Andrha Pradesh,
Chattisgarh, Gujarat, Karnataka, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra,
Orissa and Tamil Nadu.
The goal of
SPED II is to contribute to the reduction of poverty in these vulnerable
village communities by ensuring efficient management of natural resources,
increased educational status, and improved health and economic conditions.
This will be done with sensitivity to the social, economic, and political
contexts of the respective village communities and the marginalized groups
within them, including women. The role of SAFP is to address poverty on a
long-term basis by facilitating the creation of replicable community
models and developmental knowledge at the grassroots level. This will
further empower community organizations and local NGOs to influence local
policy-making bodies so that the needs of the people are taken into
consideration in development matters. Promoting participatory involvement
and helping to build new capacities among community members through the
promotion of skills and knowledge is critical to the success of SPED II.
The SPED II
Program involves funding for the following program activities:
·
Integrated Watershed Development
·
Promoting Basic and Primary Education
·
Improving Health Status of Communities
·
Promotion of Sustainable Livelihood Initiatives and Micro-Enterprises
·
Environment Consciousness Building
·
Capacity Building and Promoting Good Governance
·
Gender Mainstreaming
·
Management and Monitoring
·
Public Engagement
SPED II:
Integrated Watershed Management
A watershed is
a natural topographical unit based on natural drainage and water flow, and
is used as a unit of planning for the use and conservation of soil and
water resources. A watershed consists of three systems:
·
Natural system:
eg. ponds, wells, streams, vegetation, soil. Regeneration or restoration
of these natural resources is the major activity of the watershed
development process.
·
Economic system:
consists of the
production process relationship, and livelihood, which is related to the
natural system.
·
Socio-political system:
ownership or
control of resources, and issues of power, rights, and economic
regulation.
For SPED II, 32 villages with degraded watersheds and vulnerable
populations were identified and targeted for intervention by 32 partner
NGOs in Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu states. Through participatory
planning with local community-based organizations in the watershed area,
specific activities are designed and training is provided. Activities
include income generation projects as well as construction or
reconstruction of houses, wells, ponds, rainwater harvesting tanks, bunds,
trenches, pits, biogas units, and other pollution control and waste
management interventions, all involving gender and environment impact
assessments.
SPED II:
Promoting Basic and Primary Education
Educational
interventions will improve the skills and competence of local populations,
leading to higher income opportunities and increased involvement in civil
society. These activities give special focus on adult education and
functional literacy (especially among women); the enrollment of every girl
and boy in primary school; re-enrollment of dropouts; promoting
supplementary education to those at risk; and promoting parental
participation in education.
For SPED II, 60 villages with vulnerable populations (economically and
socially marginalized) were identified by 20 partner NGOs in 8 states and
targeted for intervention.
SPED II:
Improving the Health Status of Communities
Improved
community health and hygiene will decrease the incidence of personal
illness; this will enhance the overall wellbeing and security of community
members, increase productivity and income generation opportunities, and
lead to reduced child and maternal mortality. These activities will focus
on community health education and awareness, preventive health care
measures, primary health care access and community health monitoring, and
HIV/AIDS awareness in Kerala.
For
SPED II, 69 villages with vulnerable populations (economically and
socially marginalized) were identified by 23 partner NGOs in 9 states, and
targeted for intervention (same villages chosen for Education, above, plus
three in Kerala).
SPED II:
Promotion of Sustainable Livelihood Initiatives and Micro-enterprises
This will
facilitate the creation of sustainable livelihood initiatives that are
economically viable, technically feasible, and culturally acceptable. By
enhancing the skill and knowledge of partners and extending support to
target families and local CBOs, these activities strengthen local capacity
and contribute to sustainable development and poverty reduction.
For
SPED II, 19 partner NGO’s in Kerala are working with SAFP in targeted
marginalized villages, and through participatory processes, sangham
members in those villages have been identified to receive training and
financial support to start these initiatives.
SPED II:
Environment Consciousness Building
SAFP is
committed to protecting the natural resources on which the health and
livelihood of so many rural people depend. Sensitivity to the
environmental implications of all interventions is necessary, and
Environmental Impact Assessments are a requirement, assisted by the use of
local language EIA handbooks.
SPED II:
Capacity Building and Good Governance
Building
capacity at the grassroots level is of critical importance in empowering
local people to plan, implement, and monitor sustainable development
initiatives in their own communities. Likewise, in order to effectively
facilitate actions and interventions at the grassroots level, SAFP and its
partners must also strengthen their own capacity to understand the root
causes of poverty, and, in the context of village-level poverty
situations, better utilize participatory methods to effectively include
the poor in their own development process. Therefore, building
capacity at all levels through training, education, information-sharing,
and skill-building is built into all SPED II program activities.
SPED II:
Gender Mainstreaming
SAFP is
committed to achieving gender equality, and as a means of addressing
gender disparity, gender mainstreaming is applied across all SPED II
program activities as a cross-cutting theme. By integrating gender
considerations into all organizational and program activities—planning,
implementation, monitoring, evaluation, reflection—SAFP and its partners
increase their own capacity to understand, promote, and facilitate
development that views the needs of women and men equally. Gender impact
assessments guide this process at the planning stage by recognizing the
often-different needs of men and women, and by determining how planned
interventions will differentially affect them.
SPED II:
Management and Monitoring
These
measures are essential for effective implementation and reporting of
activities, and for reliable assessment of progress. They seek to address
the provision of overall supervisory, managerial, administrative, and
extension support for the implementation of the program from beginning to
end.
SPED II:
Public Engagement
SPED II pubic
engagement activities aim to foster greater public awareness,
understanding and support of Canada’s international development work
through:
·
raising
awareness and understanding of global issues
·
raising
awareness and understanding of the diversity of peoples and cultures
·
creating
a link between Canadian benefactors/members of the public and partners in
India
·
educating Canadian benefactors on basic social justice concepts
·
increasing the development of skills, values, and attitudes
Participation:
Local people
actively participating in their own development process through
participatory planning, implementation, monitoring, and evaluation
Empowerment:
Local people
empowered by their participation in civil society.
Decentralization:
Effecting
policy change through local/grassroots level decision-making and
representation
2. Disaster
Management & Rehabilitation
SAFP maintains an
emergency relief fund to be used to assist families in case of natural
disasters such as flood, wind or landslide damage. This will provide for
food, shelter, medicine, clothing, and other needs in the event of such
catastrophic events.
Tsunami
Assistance
continues for 500 tsunami-affected families from the southern Indian
coastal regions of Tamil Nadu and Kerala. In partnership with 10 partner
DSSSs, SAFP disburses donor aid in response to the December 26, 2004
tsunami that affected coastal areas in southern India. Financial
assistance to individual families ($15 per month) is being provided for a
period of six years, along with capacity building opportunities
(entrepreneurship development training for livelihood restoration and
environmental regeneration programs). In the selection process, special
priority was given to widows with young children under 13 years of age.
In partnership
with the Women’s Initiative Network (WIN) Society of Kerala, SAFP
implemented the Tsunami Response Project (2005-2007) in the Alappuzha and
Ernakulam districts of Kerala. The beneficiaries were from the
Malikaparambu area of Chellanam, a region that was badly affected by water
damage. Funding assistance was directed to environmental regeneration
activities: roof rainwater harvesting tanks, septic tank toilets,
replacement of leach pits, and mangrove planting, as well as for training
and promotion of sustainable income generating initiatives.
3.Donor
Special Projects
SAFP works with various partners to implement specially
funded projects. Examples are: helping to eradicate child labour through
sensitization of parents/employers and informal bridge schools in Andhra
Pradesh; providing for medical needs and medications of vulnerable
individuals; purchase of mini-bus for physically disabled children ;
purchase of solar water heating system for a home for destitutes in Tamil
Nadu; house construction for widows; funding for a short-stay home for
women in difficult or abusive situations in Kerala; helping to fund staff
salaries for counselors; assisting with basic needs of elderly and
destitute in West Bengal: supporting Kutchi traditional handicraft
collective in Gujarat; supporting tribal primary school in Kerala
4.Aiswaryagram facilitates and promotes
participatory research in rural development, rural resource management,
rural marketing, natural resource management, bio-diversity promotion, non
conventional energy resources, sustainable farming, composting, livestock
development, rural technology, etc. The collaboration and linkages with
various research institutions, national and international governmental
agencies, research centers and voluntary organizations are playing a
pro-active role in our participatory action research (PAR) and technology
development (PTD) processes.
