Ukhrul District Community Resource Management Society

The Ukhrul District is   one   of   the    eight districts of Manipur state.  The district comprises of 230 (two hundred thirty) Villages. It occupies an area of 4,544 Sq. Km. having an approximate of 1,35,000 (One Lakh Thirty Five Thousand) population. Ukhrul is the District Headquarter. There are five sub-divisions in the District, Viz, Ukhrul, Chingai, Phungyar, kamjong and Kasom Khullen. Traditionally it is divided into five zones viz: Kamo – South, known for woodcraft, Kathur – Centre, Raphei – North, known for traditional salt processing technology, earthern pottery and carving wooden plate, Kharao – West, known for traditional attire weaving & designing, Remyang – East, known for cane and bamboo works.

The District is inhabited mainly by the major tribes of Tangkhul Nagas. However, besides them there are also other tribe like Kukis and Maring. The district has well defined traditional Institutions, which is like a tiny republic. The village chief is known as the Headman (Awunga) and the Minister of Council are the clan representatives (Hanga). Women are generally excluded from the village council; however through the project intervention now the village council sits with women for planning and implementation for the development of the village.

LOCATION:

 It is located between 24 Degrees North 25 Degrees South and 41 minutes North Latitude and between 94 Degrees 47 minutes longitude. It shares its boundary with Chandel District in the South, Imphal and Senapati District in the West and Nagaland State in the North. In the East it represents a transit zone between Indo-Myanmar.

The District is rich in bio-diversity and is one of the areas in the North East Region, which has rare, endangered species & endemic species that is yet to be explored. The district is also known to have a great treasure of Medicinal plants & animals. The people in the district area use over innumerable number of plants & animals species for medicinal purposes. The district is also a home to a wide variety of cereal crops, fruits and vegetables of tropical, sub-tropical & aromatic plants. 

Project Objective: 

The overall objective of the Project is to improve the livelihood of the most vulnerable group of people by managing the natural resources - Land, Forest, Water and Human, without jeopardising the environment.

q       Land - It is the source of food, thus needs to improve productivity through appropriate technologies and methods e.g., double cropping, mixed cropping and introducing high yielding varieties etc… These are the key issues to be looked into.

q       Forest - To control degradation of forest by conserving and protecting the biodiversity one needs to manage judiciously the forest resources for day-to-day survival. Without forest the very existence of life is incomplete.

q       Water - Water itself is life and life without water is unthinkable. In other words, life and water are inseparable. Hence, water must be conserved and used discretely in order to make our lives wholesome.

q       Human - While talking about human beings, there are four basic things that we need to look into: -

1. Social.

2. Economic.

3. Health and,

4. Education.

In order to improve the quality of life and human values, the above four mentioned factors are to be thoroughly understood, and we need to pursue them diligently in every step of our lives.  

THE PROCESS OF IMPLEMENTING THE PROJECT ACTIVITIES:

        Under the aegis of International Fund for Agricultural Development and Government of India through NEC, Ukhrul District Community Resource Management Society (UDCRMS) was first established in 1997 as a legal entity and an implementing agency of the North Eastern Community Resource Management Project (NERCRMP) for upland areas. However, the actual functioning of UDCRMS was realised only when the Development Support Team (DST) was put into place in 1999. Immediately, intensive orientation took place for the newly recruited Staff (DST) in order to impart the Project’s objective, approaches and philosophy. This followed by selection of partner NGOs and project villages. So far nine (9) Partner NGOs are associated with the project. There are altogether 10 (ten) clusters with 146 NaRM-Gs in 103 Villages.

Impact Evaluation:

In order to assess the Project impact, baseline survey was done by ORG in 2002, but much of their reports were not relevant at the ground situation. The Project had also introduced Participatory Impact Monitoring (PIM) to all the NaRM-Gs in 2001. But the exercise was unable to materialize at the grass root level due to the lengthiness of its tools. The same was redefined again in Pictorial form by Ukhrul DST and now Participatory Pictorial Impact Monitoring (PPIM) has been successfully grounded.  

(Sample of over all Participatory Pictorial Impact Monitoring)

Components:

The Project's objectives are being achieved through the following components: -

1. Institution building.

v     Gender Mainstreaming Workshop

v     Communication Skills and Conflict Management Workshop

v     Micro Enterprise Development training

v     Book Keeping & Accountancy and Monitoring & Evaluation Training.

v     Training on Malaria (CME) for selected Health workers.

v     NaRM-G Cluster Association Inception Workshop.

v     Participatory Pictorial Impact Monitoring Workshop.

2. Livelihood.

The objective of the economic livelihood activities are to expand viable income-earning activities for resource poor households in crops, horticulture, forestry, livestock, fish production and non-farm activities using sustainable and environmentally sound practices.

3. Infrastructure.

4. Natural Resource Development.

v     Awareness workshop for conservation of Kashong.

v     A one-day awareness workshop on Natural Resource Management of Zingsho Land.

v    A district level Awakening Day on Habitat Management and Natural Resource Management.

v     Workshop on Natural Resource Management and poverty alleviation.

v     Sustainable Agriculture and Livestock Management training.

5. Social Sector.

The objectives of this component are to:

a) Improve access of communities to safe drinking water and better health care

b) Provide young people with a better understanding of the village environment and a greater willingness to remain in the village and promote sustainable agricultural production.

6. Village Roads and Rural Electrification

The objectives of this component are to:

a) Assist communities to upgrade and construct a village road that will improve access to their villages and facilitate movement of produces to markets.

b) Provide electricity to a number of communities with a view to broadening the economic base of the rural economy through opening up possibilities for
the development of non-farm activities.

CAPACITY BUILDING STATUS ON COMMUNITY INSTITUTION BUILDING (CIB)

FROM INCEPTION TILL DATE (1999- MARCH 2005)