The Hindu Business Line : HUDA's green drive shelters poor women

THE Hyderabad Urban Development Authority's (HUDA) plan to improve greenery and develop polluted lakes is proving to be a godsend one for the poor and uneducated women in ten municipalities and 103 gram panchayats under its purview.

About 5,170 women from 595 women groups have earned Rs 1.25 crore so far, raising 1.59 crore saplings for HUDA's beautification projects covering 18,688 hectares in the last eight years.

"Realising their latent energies, they have diversified their activities. Now, they are into vermi composting, vegetable cultivation, candle making and floriculture," Mr P.V. Ramana Reddy, Director (Urban Forestry) of HUDA, said.

According to him, their involvement in nursery programme had opened up a variety of opportunities.

Despite the fact that the diversified activity doesn't fall into its purview, the urban development authority has started training women in groups to upgrade their skills that could enhance their earnings.

For one, women in Manneguda village were trained in vermi compost. "Within no time they learnt the trade," he said.

Similarly, the women group at Bathula Cheruvu had taken up cultivation of leafy vegetables.

"Of the 103 panchayats, we have covered 50 so far. We are going to places wherever women showed interest in our programme," he told Business Line.

Seeing the increased interest among women, the HUDA has scaled up the target for the current year. "We have set a target of 25 lakh saplings for 165 groups for the year as against 16.71 lakh saplings for 143 groups in 2003," Ms Savitri, the in-charge of women empowerment programme, said.

"We select the poorest of the poor women for homestead nurseries," she said.

Taking the empowerment project a step forward, the HUDA has embarked on a plan to support prospective entrepreneurs among the groups. "In the first phase, we are going to disburse Rs 6-7 lakh for about 10 groups after going through their project reports," she said.

In a bid to encourage the women entrepreneurs, the HUDA gave them space at a park developed at Keesara on the city outskirts to showcase their projects to the devotees who visit the temple on Sivaratri.

"About 100 women from 20 groups will be displaying their products during the festival at the ancient temple site. This will initiate them for larger expos," Mr Reddy said.

More Stories on : Environment | Gender | Andhra Pradesh

Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page