Divi Neguma incorporates diverse projects

By Dhaneshi YATAWARA

To ensure sustainable income and employment specially to rural families through strengthening the home based economy, the Government set up the Divi Neguma'program.

In the process the Government decided to establish a new Department for Divi Neguma combined Rural Development and the Cabinet of Ministers approved the paper presented by the Economic Development Minister Basil Rajapaksa seeking approval to instruct the Legal Draftsman to draft legislation for the purpose.

As stated in the Cabinet Paper, the department will be established amalgamating the Department of the Samurdhi Commissioner General, Sri Lanka Samurdhi Authority, Department of Upcountry Peasantry Rehabilitation, Sri Lanka Udarata Development Authority and the Sri Lanka Southern Development Authority. "This step is to accelerate the Government development work avoiding the possible space for duplicating in steps taken by these institutes," said Director General of the Regional Development Division of the Economic Development Ministry Chandra Wickramasinghe. She is also the Samurdhi Commissioner General.

"All these institutes work towards eliminating poverty from the country. It is the view of the Government under the 'Mahinda Chinthana' vision for tomorrow that to bring attention to low income families in the society and implementing relief programs enabling them to achieve a sustainable standard of living jointly with nutritional assistance programs. This is to see a country where poverty is minimal," Wickramasinghe said. According to her, the prepared Bill is with the Legal Draftsman and as the Ministry plans the process will complete soon.

"The Divi Neguma action plan will continue without any interruption. Thus the alterations, new additions etc to the Divi Neguma program will continue as scheduled," she added.

Strength and stability of a family depicts that of the community in which it lives, be it a village or a city. Good health and steady flow of income are key factors for such a strong and happy family in anywhere in the world. Continuous illnesses and fluctuating income only adds frustration to a family which surely will depict in the immediate society too.

The village community still dominates the Sri Lankan culture and 80 percent of the population live in rural areas. The rural economy plays a major role in strengthening the national economy. Thus 'Divi Neguma' began in the village initially with a plan to establish more than 62,000 Cottage Industrial Economic Units at village level. According to the Economic Development Ministry nearly 2.1 million families had joined the Divi Neguma program in 2011 and the government hopes to increase this to 2.5 million domestic units this year.

Our village, while retaining its strengths and impressive features, can be developed as a micro centre of growth - with the vision that village has to be a decent and comfortable place for people to live, work and engage in their cultural and communal activities.

"Through Divi Neguma we plan to strengthen the family unit economically and make them self sustainable", Economic Development Minister Basil Rajapaksa said speaking at the launch on the new phase of the Divi Neguma in February this year. With fresh hope of the new phase, the Ministry declared March 2012 as a special planning month for the Divi Neguma program. Officials of the Divi Neguma program visited selected households of a Grama Niladhari Division and discuss with the family of its potentials, strengths and weaknesses. Under the new phase households of 14,000 Grama Niladhari divisions will be covered where teams under the Grama Niladhari, Agriculture Research Assistant and the Samurdhi Officer will visit each family. The team will comprise officers with expertise in agriculture, agrarian services and agriculture management. The team will analyse the present state of the agricultural land of the family and proper changes to develop its productivity.

Amidst its wide scope the Divi Neguma program has helped boost vegetable production. It is regrettable that a large amount of foreign exchange had been spent on importation of food items which could be grown locally. For example the Government spends US dollars 50 million to import dried chillies. An accelerated program is necessary under the Divi Neguma to save the money drained out on such imports and make it available to local farmers.

Divi Neguma is not a project only to promote home gardening. It is the first phase of the project. Divi Neguma targets identified three backward communities - i.e. estate community, urban slum dwellers and the fishing community.

As a new step, villagers who are willing to maintain a herd of cattle will be given Rs.25,000 financial assistance to develop it as a dairy industry. According to the Economic Development Ministry as of to date 5,000,000 seed packets were distributed in all 25 districts under the 'Divi Neguma' program. Nearly 2,000,000 plant saplings of fruits such as Rambutan, Cashew, Mango, Pomegranate, Wood apple, avocado and export crops such as pepper were distributed throughout the country. The success of a national program depends mainly on the active participation of people. There is however a limit to what the government could do. The government can provide technical and other assistance to the families who wish to launch agricultural, fishing and industrial projects. Yet it is the people's enthusiasm that will make the country alive.

In a post conflict situation early recovery is essential. At the very initial stages people need quick impact projects and then long-term measures for economic and social stability. Eliminating poverty is the biggest challenge any government would face amidst the heavily fluctuating prices of the world consumer market. In such a backdrop rather going on mass scale it sounds more effective to strengthen the smallest unit of the society, the family. The stronger this unit is the stronger the society would be.