Strengthening resilience in tsunami-affected communities : coastal bioshields, livelihood development, and village knowledge centres in India and Sri Lanka; final report (April 2006 to March 2009)

Abstract

The project on Strengthening Resilience of Tsunami affected Communities in India and Sri Lanka was implemented from April 2006 to March 2009. The project components include community mobilization and organization, establishment of mangrove and non-mangrove bioshield, establishment of Village Resource and Village Knowledge Centres, strengthening livelihood and community based disaster risk reduction. In India project was implemented in 10 villages in Tamil Nadu (including 2 Village Resource Centres) and 8 villages in Andhra Pradesh. In order to enhance the capacity of the grassroots organizations in designing and implementing developmental projects in the coastal areas grassroots NGOs were taken as project implementers at the village level. Informal relationship was established with various strategic partners such as local elected government (Panchayat Raj), government institutions, research organizations, developmental NGOs for participation in the implementation of different project components. A science-based, community-centered and process-oriented approach, which was developed and tested earlier, was followed in the implementation of this project with suitable modifications wherever necessary. In each of the project village activities were planned and implemented by a village level institution, which is having more or less equal number of women and men in the decision making and planning and implementation bodies. With participation of community and strategic partners mangrove bioshield has been established in about 280 ha and non-mangrove bioshield in 27 ha, which are about 1 to 2 years old. Presently, except in about 30 ha in Keezhavaipar region in Tamil Nadu, in all other places bioshield are showing promising results. In order to sustain these bioshields long term management plan needs to be prepared and pilot tested. In Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh, 4 VRCs and 10 VKCs have been established with the support of community and strategic partners…