About PRADAN
PRADAN’s mission is to nurture ‘the best and the brightest with social commitment’ to engage with the poorest for social and economic change. With 35 years of engagement on issues of rural poverty, PRADAN visualizes the creation of a just and equitable society where everyone lives and work with dignity, by building robust collectives of women that will strive for large-scale change in human condition. Today around 500 professionals trained in diverse disciplines like management, sciences, engineering, agriculture, social sciences etc. at reputed institutions work with the community directly.
PRADAN’s outreach is spread across the heartlands of Central and Eastern India in the states of Bihar, Jharkhand, Odisha, Chhattisgarh, WB, MP as well as southern Rajasthan. PRADAN works in the poorest 37 22 districts in India with more than 50000 SHGs across 7434 villages reaching out to 3.5 million people. These areas are characterized by intense poverty, low Human Development Index [HDI] and hilly terrain with the largest concentration of indigenous tribes. PRADAN works with mainstream agencies like Government of India and state governments to bring about large-scale change at the grassroots.
PRADAN’s Impact
PRADAN has done pioneering work around women’s Self-Help Groups [SHGs]. This gave the required initial impetus to the women’s SHG movement in India. The SHG approach is now the lynchpin mobilization strategy in the National Rural Livelihoods Mission [NRLM] in India. Since then, over 100 million women have been organized for empowerment, bank linkages and livelihood intervention through state and NGO efforts. PRADAN initiated sectoral Institutions like Tasar Development Foundation [TDF] and National Smallholder Poultry Development Trust [NSPDT], making these the largest organized efforts in the country for small landholders. PRADAN has also collaborated with Ambedkar University Delhi to groom Development Practitioners. PRADAN is the National Support Organization to NRLM, the flagship rural development program of the Government of India.
MFE supported Projects
“Promotion of comprehensive livelihoods for bringing transformational change in lives of people”
This program is being implemented in the Sirohi district in Rajasthan. The 10,000 families (almost 50,000 persons) in 2 Blocks of Sirohi district will be facilitated to promote comprehensive livelihoods for transformational changes in their lives. Women being at the kernel of interventions, the comprehensive nature of the project intends to benefit the entire household (all members) in terms of improved quality of life, ensured well-being and improved nutrition status. The ST, SC and OBC families would constitute more than 70% of the project outreach. The foremost objective of economic empowerment will be served through 75-100% increase in the income from their own farms with established livelihoods prototypes in agriculture and livestock activities as well as their farm livelihoods support system will enhance with established women lead farmer producer organizations, added irrigation and soil & water conservation infrastructures. All the families will have enhanced nutrition from their own farm production and observe changes at behavior & practice level in gender and governance.