The World Bank has approved $1-billion credit for National Rural Livelihoods Project (NRLP), which it said is aimed at strengthening the implementation of India’s newly launched National Rural Livelihoods Mission (NRLM).
NRLM is one of the world’s largest poverty reduction initiatives of about $7.7 billion, aiming to reach 350 million people or almost a quarter of India’s population.
The project would help NRLM create an institutional platform by mobilising rural poor, particularly women, into robust grassroot institutions of their own, where with the strength of the group behind them, they will be able to exert voice and accountability over the providers of educational, health, nutritional and financial services.
This, based on the past experience in several Indian states, is expected to have a transformational social impact, supporting the country’s efforts to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) on Nutrition, Gender, and Poverty, the World Bank said in a press statement.
“The success of NRLM, which is expected to serve as a backbone for pulling together all other poverty reduction efforts under one umbrella, will help India move closer to some of the key MDGs in the near future,” said Mr Venu Rajamony, Joint Secretary in the Department of Economic Affairs, Union Finance Ministry.
The World Bank said the National Rural Livelihoods Project would help the programme scale up the successes of past livelihoods initiatives to other lagging regions of the country.