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Our Strategic Choices: 2008-2017:
AwazCDS
intends to assist local and
national partners to work
towards achieving the Millennium
Development Goals of halving
poverty and reducing hunger,
promoting gender equality and
promoting health related
knowledge and empowerment of
women, increasing environmental
sustainability, and building a
global partnership for
development. Opportunities for
AwazCDS to play a meaningful
role, lie in its comparative
advantage, as the only Learning
and Knowledge Centre in the
Southern Punjab. The
organisation can contribute
through its areas of
comparative strength:
Making knowledge useful
As a Learning and Knowledge
Centre, AwazCDS is a catalyst
for strategies and policy
innovations. The organization
and its partners build and test
area knowledge databases,
facilitate the widest possible
exchange and sharing of area
information and knowledge,
provide the structure to allow
those who need information and
knowledge to find those who
possess it, and build the skills
needed for knowledge
application. AwazCDS plays a
pivotal role in Southern Punjab
knowledge management, i.e.
acquisition, modification,
packaging, and sharing.
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Social
Mobilization
Mobilization of intended
participants and beneficiaries
of programmes, through formation
of groups, participatory rural
appraisal (PRA), and so on has
been an important part of rural
development and poverty
alleviation programmes and
projects in recent years. These
processes have been found to
help not only in improving
programme delivery and outputs,
but also in making a significant
contribution to building social
capital. They have also helped,
particularly in relatively
better endowed and accessible
areas, in accessing resources,
services, and markets for
productive activities. In rural
areas, however, these groups
have often found it difficult,
beyond a point, to use the
awareness and organization they
have built for themselves to
improve their livelihoods
because of limited access to
productive resources and
exposure to markets. Some
success has been achieved in
this respect by those organized
around a common interest like
production of similar
commodities and use of common
property resources like forests.
In other cases, even where the
groups are able to pool their
resources, they have not been
able to put them to productive
use. Notable examples are those
of the several women’s savings
and credit groups through which
large sums of money have been
collected in small
contributions, but have remained
idle due to the lack of
investing opportunities and/or
of initiative on the part of
programmes to identify and plan
such opportunities.
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Partnership and network building
AwazCDS presents a unique
opportunity to bring together
different strata of civil
society on to a common platform
where discussion, debate, and
solutions to issues of mutual
concern and cross-fertilization
of ideas for sustainable
development are made possible.
AwazCDS has been fostering and
building partnerships and
networks in rural and urban-slum
development at the local,
national, regional, and global
levels that would otherwise not
be possible.
Strategic enhancement of
partnerships among agencies and
institutions engaged in area
development both within and
beyond the Southern Punjab
region are extremely important;
and this includes fostering
private and public sector
collaboration, currently a rare
phenomenon. As the voice and
influence of a diverse civil
society, especially of
grassroots’ networks and
associations, are growing in
policy and public action
choices, AwazCDS will continue
to assist in providing local,
national and regional linkages.
AwazCDS will play a proactive
role in nurturing local,
national, and regional
partnerships by linking micro
and macro-level knowledge,
facilitating networking, and
sharing of experiences.
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Capacity Building
Human
capital, no doubt, has been
found to be a major contributor
to development and poverty
alleviation. No other approach,
either based on physical
infrastructure development,
capital investment or technology
has been found to have sustained
success unless accompanied by
development of human capital,
particularly education,
technical skills, enterprise,
organizational capabilities, and
health. Most southern Punjab
areas have a weak human capital
base due both to limited access
to social infrastructure and
lack of exposure to knowledge
and experience of activities
that enhance human capital
endowment. Efforts to improve
the human capital base of rural
people are essential for
improvement in their general
well being, but by itself if may
not lead to alleviation of
poverty because of the limited
opportunities for its effective
use in economically and socially
productive activities. In fact,
education, a major means of
human capital formation, results
in outflow of human resources,
for that reason, resulting in a
decline in the productive
capabilities of the population
in rural areas. It is well known
that most educated persons
migrate out of rural areas.
Reducing Poverty and
Environmental Hazards
AwazCDS has
been engaged in reducing poverty
and addressing environmental
hazards since its inception by
carrying out appropriates
projects including policy
advocacy. During the strategic
period 2008-20017 it will
continue its focus on
programs/projects on poverty
reduction and environmental
hazards. In addition, AwazCDS
will execute projects rural
based specific economic and
social development in accordance
with community needs.
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Regional cooperation
AwazCDS
addresses issues of a
Trans-boundary nature where
solutions lie in the
interdependence between
countries. Regional cooperation
is increasingly important for
sharing information and
coordinating policies on a wide
spectrum of issues directly
affecting area people and those
living extreme poverty and
under-privileged. AwazCDS’s
emphasis will be on areas that
require countries to work
together to streamline policies,
procedures, and regulations;
e.g. bring peace and harmony,
preventive measures to mitigate
effects of droughts and floods
(such as sudden release of water
in Sutluj and Bias River),
exchange of technical
information and databases for
regional planning, and market
opportunities that lie across
national borders or require a
joint strategy, to name just a
few.
Global
warming and climate change are
being increasingly accepted as
phenomena with far-reaching
implications on ecosystems and
rural peoples. Increasingly
unpredictable and erratic
climatic conditions and more
frequent incidences of droughts
and floods that are attributed
to climate change are already
being experienced in many parts
of the region. Unless preventive
measures are taken to mitigate
the impacts from such natural
disasters, whole ecosystems and
communities are likely to suffer
irrevocable consequences. There
is increasing demand and
opportunity to take this
initiative and develop new
programmes to combat
climate-induced disasters.
AwazCDS therefore would start
working to address some of these
challenges.
The alarming
increase in violent conflicts in
the region, fuelled by
persistent poverty and various
forms of exploitation and social
injustice, is of growing
concern. While AwazCDS does not
have a mandate to engage with
the political and security
issues involved, it can foster
regional cooperation in natural
resource management and provide
venues for the rights and equity
of marginalized peoples to be
supported through strengthening
policies of decentralization –
as well as supporting women-led
institutions.
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Policy
Development and Advocacy
SAARC Regional member countries
were party to setting the
Millennium Development Goals and
are increasingly committed to
working towards fulfilling the
targets set for the year 2015.
AwazCDS will work closely with
regional member countries to
identify the innovative
practices, policies,
technologies, and approaches
that are emerging as successful
in the rural context for
alleviating poverty, ensuring
equity, and protecting the
fragile environment in the
region.
Throughout the Southern Punjab,
awareness is growing of the need
for equal social rights and
opportunities for social
mobilization and participation
in governance by women and
marginalized groups in rural
areas. The voice and influence
of a diverse range of civil
society organizations,
especially grassroots’ networks
and associations, is growing in
policy and public action
choices. AwazCDS can play a
proactive role in nurturing such
movements by providing the
necessary knowledge and
information support and by
facilitating networking and
sharing of experiences.
Assisting governments to address
emerging conflicts in the use of
vital resources like land,
water, and rangeland through
identification of alternative
policy options; livelihood
opportunities; and creating
rural sensitive support
infrastructure are some of the
key areas where AwazCDS can
intervene to alleviate poverty
in Southern Punjab's rural
areas. Success stories in
livelihood enhancement
capitalize on opportunities
provided by rural environments
and cultures for specialized
crops and products as well as
sustainable and locally
beneficial tourism and
pilgrimage.
AwazCDS will
facilitate policy dialogue
around these options through its
formal and informal networks of
public institutions,
international and bilateral
donor agencies, NGOs, INGOs,
universities and training
institutions, and relevant
private entities so that
regional member countries can
use AwazCDS actively in
pursuance of their development
agenda. Support for informed
policy advocacy and change will
be the culmination of AwazCDS’s
catalytic role in knowledge
sharing. Improved documentation
of the impact of various options
will be used to provide
empirical grounding for
governments and advocacy groups
to make policies more relevant
and supportive of marginalized
rural peoples.
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