In 2011, Mahila Kisan Sashaktikaran Pariyojana (MKSP) was launched in Kerala as a sub component of Nation Rural Livelihood Mission (NRLM) with the objectives of increasing the visibility of women in agriculture, reducing drudgery and providing livelihood opportunities by adopting sustainable and eco-friendly agriculture. Till then, the lack of resources, skills and knowledge were leading rural women to accept menial jobs for meagre salary. Through the intervention of Joint liability groups (JLG), Kudumbashree tries to address these issues by collectivising the rural women to undertake lease land farming and they are encouraged to become first time farmers from peasants.

JLG is a group of four to ten women, coming together to undertake agriculture as part of their livelihood. They lease the lands from land owners and start cultivation based on the local resource availability. Lease land farming and collective farming as intervention was started in 2003-04, which over the years has achieved various milestones. Presently there are more than 70,652 Joint liability groups undertaking cultivation in 43,774 hectare of land. As the project has grown over the years, the number of JLG and area under cultivation has increased, however the limited resources at the staff level often resulted in reduced monitoring of this many groups. In order to overcome this challenge, community level evaluation agents named as JEVA (JLG evaluation agents) were instituted in 2017, as part of this programme, 605 women master farmers were selected through a rigorous selection procedure to create this evaluation team. 4 JEVA members are in charge of each of the 152 blocks of Kerala. These agents physically verify the cultivation of the JLG and provide the necessary inputs for farming group. Presently more than 50620 JLG has been evaluated by the JEVA agent by visiting their farm lands.

The Start-up Village Entrepreneurship Programme (SVEP) envisages to help the rural poor come out of poverty by helping them set up enterprises and provide support till the enterprises stabilize. This will be done by providing them with business skills, exposure, loans for starting and business support during the first critical six months of the enterprises by using the NRLM SHGs and their federations. Kudumbashree NRO played a crucial role in the development of the concept of SVEP. In its first phase of validating the concept, SVEP is expected to support creation and strengthening of about 1.82 lakh village enterprises in 125 Blocks across 24 States in the targeted four years i.e. 2015-19. This is expected to create employment for about 3.78 lakh persons.

Two blocks in Kerala were approved by the Empowered Committee of NRLM for the implementation of SVEP in 2016. Parakkode block in Pathanamthitta district and Vaduvakode block in Ernakulam district were the blocks approved for Kerala. Detailed Project Reports (DPRs) were finalized in November 2016, after field surveys assessing household demand and existing local enterprise conditions to identify the opportunities for enterprise development in the blocks. The period of implementation of SVEP in these two blocks is from February 2017 to February 2021. The total budget for the implementation is Rs. 11.35 crores (Rs. 5.7 crores in Parakkode and Rs. 5.6 crores in Vaduvakode). Of this 40% of the costs will be borne by Government of Kerala and 60% by the central government. The Empowered Committee of NRLM has approved 12 more blocks in the remaining 12 districts in kerala for SVEP implementation in 2017.

The State Level Co-ordination Committee (SLCC) selected 23 new proposals which have come before the committee for the approval. Through 34 PIAs 18,025 candidates were trained out of which, 12,763 were appointed .The total sanctioned training target is 51,200. A proposal has been submitted by Manpower Group Services India Pvt. Ltd., a Champion Employer designated by MoRD. The committee agreed to consider the proposal under Training and placement model and sanctioned a total target of 2000 numbers.

The Meeting was chaired by Shri. A. Shajahan, IAS, LSGD Secretary. Shri. S. Harikishore, IAS, Executive Director, Kudumbashree, Smt. Lethi. S, Additional Secretary to Finance Department, Smt. P.K. Seethalekshmi Amma, Additional Secretary to Labour and SkillsDepartment,Smt. Nisha. S, Additional Secretary to Govt. on deputation as Director (A&F), Kudumbashree, Shri. K.S. Dharmarajan, Additional Director, Directorate of Employment and Industrial Training Department, Shri. Divakaran.M.N., Additional Director, Scheduled Caste Development Department, Smt. Josephine. J, Assistant Director, Scheduled Tribes Development Department, Shri. Mahesh.L.S., Manager (R&HRD), Kerala State Women’s Development Corportation Ltd, Shri. J. Harikrishnan, Chief Operating Officer, KASE, Shri. Pradeep, Senior Superintendant, Social Justice Department and other concerned officers attended the meeting which was held at Government Secretariate Annexe1 in the Chamber of Secretary, LSGD, on 21 July 2017.

Vulnerability Mapping is a collective action to identify and address the existing vulnerabilities in a community. Vulnerabilities will be reflecting in different forms and lead the people to poverty or to any hazard or shocking situation. The way women experiencing vulnerability is different from men due to social construction and gender differentiation.

In December 2016, Kudumbashree started mapping activities with the support of 100 trained Gender Resource Persons. The second phase of state level training for vulnerability mapping trainers was carried out in Agricultural Co-operative Staff Training Institute (ACSTI), Manvila, Thiruvananthapuram from 24- 29 July , 2017. Two representatives each from 140 LSG’s and 2 Gender core team members were participated in the training. 300 facilitators were trained for VM process.

The Ministry of Rural Development, Government of India, has identified Kudumbashree as a National Resource Organization for SVEP. In 2016, four states have taken up SVEP Projects with Kudumbashree NRO as the implementation agency. These include Bihar (6 blocks), Jharkhand (5 blocks), Rajasthan (2 blocks) and Kerala (2 blocks).
Kudumbashree NRO is supporting 3 partner state missions (partner SRLMs) in implementing SVEP in 13 blocks other than the two blocks in Kerala as per approval of the Empowered Committee, since 2016.

In Bihar, the blocks where Kudumbashree NRO is supporting implementation of SVEP are Bodhgaya and Barachatti (Gaya district), Dhanarua (Patna district), Jandaha (Vaishali district), and, Muraul and Mushahari (Muzaffarpur district). Of these, both blocks in Gaya and Muzaffarpur have been areas where the MEC Project was being implemented by Kudumbashree NRO. In Jharkhand, the blocks where Kudumbashree NRO is supporting implementation of SVEP are Angara (Ranchi district), Khuntpani and Manoharpur (West Singhbum district), and, Littipara and Pakuria (Pakur district). All the blocks in Jharkhand have been areas where the MEC Project was being implemented by Kudumbashree NRO. In Rajasthan, the blocks where Kudumbashree NRO is supporting implementation of SVEP are Begun (Chittorgarh district) and Kekri (Ajmer district). The Empowered Committee has approved Kudumbashree NRO to support SVEP implementation, starting in 2017, in 3 blocks in Chattisgarh, 5 blocks in Madya Pradesh, 2 blocks in Andhra Pradesh and 2 blocks in Telengana besides 4 additional blocks in Jharkhand.

Learning Visits to Kudumbashree, the State Poverty Eradication Mission, Kerala

When it comes to the socio-economic and women empowerment aspects, Kudumbashree’s development experience in Kerala is gaining relevance as a replicable model for the rest of the world. In this background, Government of India recognized Kudumbashree as a National Resource Organisation in the year 2013 and has a partnership with 13 states/ Union Territories by the year 2017-18.

The Government of India, with its National Rural Livelihood Mission (NRLM) interventions in Rural areas, is about to witness a paradigm shift in the development praxis, through an emphasis being made on the Convergence of its Community Based Organisations (CBO) with the Panchayati Raj Institution (PRI)s and with the promotion of Start up Village enterprises.

With the objective to learn the best practices from Kudumabshree, the respective State Rural Livelihood Missions are taking a lead role by getting their Community Based Organisations’ leaders, PRI Representatives and district level officials on learning visits to Kerala.

As part of this, approximately 500 participants altogether from the states of Tripura, Jharkhand, Orissa, West Bengal, Rajasthan, Bihar, Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Goa, etc. are in the process of acquiring knowledge on various projects and programs implemented by Kudumbashree. Since April 2017, there marked a huge flow of participants to Kudumbashree.

Each team is here to learn how the Local Economic Development is happening with the support of Gram Panchayat, how the peoples’ participatory planning platforms like gram sabhas form the base for Gram Panchayat Development Planning Process, how various project activities are being planned and implemented by converging with Gram Panchayats and transferred institutions, how the left out poor are been covered under various kudumbashree programs, how the GP finds its own fund, and so on. Apart from this, Ashraya Project, BUDS School, BRC, Nutrimix Units, Micro Enterprises, Joint Liability Groups for agricultural activities, Apparel Parks, Animal Husbandry programs like ‘Aadugramam and Ksheerasagaram’, are major areas of emphasis. The visit to various departmental offices such as Agricultural office, Anganwadi, Veterinary office, PHC, etc. is helping the teams in knowing the power of Gram Panchayat in framing developmental programs for the welfare of its people.

Kudumbashree NRO coordinates all such visits to Kudumbashree, initiating the spark within the community and the implementing officers, what is then taken back to their own state for being replicated.

Inauguration of Jeevanam 2017 livelihood campaign by Hon.Minister for LSGD on 19.July 2017 at Panchayat Association Hall, Trivandrum Jeevanam campaign is a flagship programme of Kudumbashree for strengthening livelihood sector by providing more emphasis on Micro Enterprise development and promotion. Formation of 3000 new enterprises,140 innovative enterprises, development of existing enterprises, formation of clusters is envisaged. Creating habit of book keeping among entrepreneurs and digitalising it as part of Jeevanam campaign is one of the highlights of the programme. Exploring new marketing avenues like online marketing, Kudumbashree Bazar, designer shops will be started as part of Jeevanam Campaign.

DDU-GKY, the skill and placement initiative of the Ministry of Rural Development (MoRD) is a significant initiative that the Government of India and Kerala State have embarked upon to turn the advantage of our young population to become the largest pool of technically trained manpower in the country/world by investing adequately in their skilling and employability, turning this youth potential into reality. ‘DDU-GKY’ aims at skilling rural poor youth and providing them with jobs in the organized sector. Kudumbashree is facilitating the mobilization of aspirants from different parts of Kerala through concerted community action in partnership with Project Implementing Agencies (PIA). The major role of Kudumbashree is to disseminate the project information, identify the right beneficiaries, counsel and motivate the candidates and track the candidates. Kudumbashree through its CDS-ADS-NHG structure has organized numerous camps at the panchayat, block and district level. Through this active participation in mobilization and follow up, Kudumbashree could able to complete training for 21, 617 students and placement for 12,000 candidates. Reaching out to the community is a humongous task involved in training and capacity building, public relations, social networking and last mile delivery. Active community based resource persons are required for support for this activity who know the local community, the youth and their aspirations. Thus Kudumbashree has launched a new scheme for incentivizing community tracking and mobilization by organizing a pool of Community based Volunteers. As part of this scheme each Community Development Society are advised to select one community Volunteer and delegate the responsibility of mobilising, tracking and maintaining “Naipunya” register (skill register). Based on the performance of the community volunteers, Kudumbashree district mission will release the incentive to concerned CDS and CDS will release the amount to Community Volunteer. It is aimed that the community will take more ownership about the program through this intervention and reach out to the right beneficiary.

Neeli ,73 year old , belonging to " vismaya neighborhood group" of angadipuram Grama Panchayat , malappuram district will receive a new home on 17.07.2017, under kudumbashree project "snehaveedu". Being a destitute, Neeli's dream came into reality with the combined efforts of  "kudumbashree neighborhood groups" and "Asraya project".  Construction of this new building started during January 2017, and with the continuous support and monitoring received from Panchayat and the district mission team this project has been successfully completed within a short span of time.

Kudumbashree was identified as a National Resource Organization in 2012 by Ministry of Rural Development, Government of India. Since then the organization has been piloting projects in 12 states and 1 union territory. The two projects that have been piloted in the partner states are convergence of Panchayat and Community Based Organizations and enterprise development using Micro Enterprise Consultants based on Kudumbashree’s experience. For the implementation of these projects, community representatives from Kudumbashree network who have demonstrated exceptional work in Kerala as CDS Chairpersons, MEC’s, members of KAASS and Training Groups have been placed in the partner-states as mentors for providing handholding support to the potential entrepreneurs. Currently, there are approximately 120 such mentors working as part of Kudumbashree NRO. With the MEC Project being scaled up in partner states and new states expressing interest in taking up projects with Kudumbashree, there is an increasing demand for engaging more mentors for support in the field. In relation to this, the selection of mentors for SVEP implementation was conducted from 9th to 11th July, 2017 at Maria Rani Centre in Thiruvananthapuram. The skills, suitability and overall experience of 59 participants were gauged through a process including written tests, group activities and interview. 43 of the participants were selected. The selected mentors will undergo a capacity building phase comprising of training in business management, soft skills and exposure to the partner states. The ones who will successfully complete the capacity building phase shall be placed in the partner states as planned for the next phase.