Offers a Certificate Programme in Rural Livelihoods
JAIPUR, November 15, 2016— The Rural Development (RD) sector today faces
complex challenges of growth, equity, climate change, and social & economic
security of the poor and vulnerable communities. This context has impressed
upon the RD programmes of government and non-government organizations a growing
need for intervention strategies that are reflective, robustly designed, and
implemented through an innovative and adaptive approach. It is clear that there
is an urgent need to address this capacity building challenge by
preparing a cadre of rural professionals who are capable of engaging in the rural
development sector specially at the sub-district levels; be it through NGOs,
government institutions or as elected representatives of the PRIs and/or
cluster level federation leaders.
IIHMR University and Bharat Rural Livelihoods
Foundation (BRLF) today jointly announced the launch of the first batch of the Certificate
Programme in Rural Livelihoods. The programme combines appropriate knowledge
and skill components through a unique yet inclusive capacity building
initiative. The programme focuses on the development of capacities of tribal
youth from 6 states of the Central Indian Tribal belt. Towards this end, BRLF and IIHMR University have brought
together 15 leading organizations in the rural livelihoods sector to facilitate
a multi-centre, multi-topic curriculum that covers different dimensions of
rural livelihoods. For
the first batch, 30 candidates have been selected from states of Rajasthan,
Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, Maharashtra, Jharkhand, and Chhattisgarh. These
candidates belong to Scheduled Tribes, De-Notified Tribes/Notified Tribes, and
Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups/communities from across BRLF mandated
geographies.
IIHMR University is India’s foremost university
committed to the health and well-being of people everywhere. BRLF is an autonomous body set up by Ministry
of Rural Development Government of India with an objective to facilitate civil
society action for transforming lives and livelihoods in the central tribal
adivasi belt in the country initially. This
Certificate Programme is the first among many initiatives of the collaboration
between IIHMR University and the BRLF. BRLF
and IIHMR University will be jointly certifying this Programme. The programme features a rounded curriculum
that explicitly recognizes the value of people’s knowledge and is enabled with
cutting edge practice support tools.
President, IIHMR University Prof. Vivek
Bhandari in his address during the Launch programme, said, “Through this partnership with BRLF, IIHMR
University will greatly enhance its capacity to impact the rural development
sector. Students of this programme will get the best of theoretical and
practical knowledge, and exposure to proven livelihoods interventions from some
of the most challenges parts of India. Pedagogically, the modules will be an
embodiment of the concept of learning by doing.”
Addressing the audience President, BRLF Dr.
Mihir Shah said, “One of the key mandates of BRLF’s
capacity building initiative is to create a pool of rural development
professionals for supporting various development interventions of Government,
CSOs and community at large. This initiative will be part of a series
of capacity building programmes under the BRLF Capacity Building
Initiative, designed and implemented as per the needs of target groups and of
different institutions currently working in the sector (Government and CSOs). “
Dr. Mihir Shah shared that this course will be
a game changer in the rural livelihoods sector since the design and delivery of
the course will provide a unique opportunity to the tribal youth to learn of
various livelihoods domains and address the issue of growing shortage of
trained human resources in the sector. Dr. Shah thanked the IIHMR University
and 15 knowledge partners under the CB initiative for making the certificate
programme possible. He also extended his warm welcome to all nominating
institutions who have sent their existing professional staff for Batch 1.
The certificate programme has 16 different
learning modules in rural livelihoods domain. Participants of the programme will learn these modules across 12 learning locations in 7 states of Central
Indian tribal belt. On completion of the course, these rural professionals will
potentially engage at block levels as drivers of positive change within Civil
Society Organizations and Government Institutions facilitating effective
implementation of social and economic security programmes/projects for tribal
rural India. .
