Livelihoods Regional Initiatives

Based on an ACCESS recommendation, the Ministry of Panchayati Raj introduced the idea of a Gateway Agency to facilitate the implementation of the Ministry's Rural Business Hubs idea. As a consequence, the Ministry invited ACCESS to become one of its lead Gateway Agency in the country, designating the organisation for three states viz Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh and Orissa.

During 2008-09, ACCESS continued its technical support to the Project Management Unit of Samajik Suvidha Sangam (SSS), a Mission Convergence body created by the Government of Delhi in pursuit of thrusts towards improving the quality of life of the most vulnerable and disadvantaged sections of society. The mandate of the mission is to bring together a plethora of schemes to a common platform to minimise duplication, strengthen the implementation mechanism by use of IT, bring reform and rationalise administrative procedures, and foster partnerships with civil society organisations for coordinated efforts in reaching the poor for quality service delivery. The whole approach is based on a single window service delivery mechanism through a multi-pronged, multi-disciplinary convergence of services covering welfare schemes such as health, education, nutrition, social security, employment, gender equity, pension and empowerment of communities. It aims at bringing together various departmental efforts for ensuring optimal benefits to the poor, to avoid delays and bring more transparency and accountability in the system. ACCESS's key responsibilities include support to stakeholders' coordination, partnership management, M&E and programme implementation that began with developing the operations manual for the Convergence Mission.

ACCESS is one of the members of the I-FIRST Consortium, led by Christian Aid, awarded with the "Poorest Area Civil Society" (PACS) 2 project to be implemented in seven states (Orissa, Madhya Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Chattisgarh, Jharkhand and Maharashtra). The project focuses on rural and urban areas that have a high concentration of socially excluded groups and very weak civil society organisations.

ACCESS in association with All India Artisans and Craft workers welfare Association (AIACA) as the lead agency was assigned the responsibility of implementing a major "Cluster Development Programme" initiated by the Development Commissioner, Handicrafts, Government of India. This programme is the first of its kind to work in 7 craft clusters across 9 states (Tripura, Manipur, Nagaland, Chattirsgarh, Sikkim, Jharkhand, Uttarkhand, Himachal Pradesh and Assam). On a 5-year perspective, the initiative targets 7,500 artisans and aims at enhancing their income through skill training, marketing, design interventions and common infrastructure. By jointly working on this project, AIACA and ACCESS will assimilate the experiences of both the organisations and thus strengthen the intervention.

The highlight of ACCESS's presence in West Bengal in 2008-09 has been its decisive involvement in the State Government's KUSP programme and its expansion from Kolkata to several other municipalities across the state. Bearing witness to the success of this programme, Sir Dorabji Tata Trust has shown interest in furthering its implementation. Kolkata Urban Services for the Poor (KUSP) is an urban reforms program implemented by the Municipal Affairs Department of the Government of West Bengal with financial aid from the Department for International Development (DFID), UK. In 2005, KUSP created the Innovative Challenge Fund (ICF) to provide financial support to civil society initiatives that aimat improving the condition of thevulnerable and the poor. ACCESS wasassigned the responsibilities of Fund Manager for KUSP in April 2008, with the key role of overall guidance, direction and facilitation of the programme. This project is unique for ACCESS in terms of implementation: the role of ACCESS here is to foster, nurture and incubate new projects initiated by Community Development Societies (CDS) and ensure their quality implementation by providing inputs and strong monitoring, adding value to their proposed interventions.