Gemidiriya Community Development and Livelihood Improvement Project was designed to assist the implementation of the Government Poverty Alleviation Strategy. The World Bank has agreed to provide facilities amounting to US$ 181 million for a period of 12 years for the implementation of the project on successful operation of the model. A grant of US$ 51 million has already been made available by the World Bank to implement the first phase of four years. The Gemidiriya Project model has been pilot tested successfully by the Village Self-Help Learning Initiative (VSHLI) in Polonnaruwa District for the past five years.
VSHLI was launched by the International Development Agency of the World Bank in 1999 as a pilot project with the Japan Social Development Fund and Mahaweli Restructuring and Rehabilitation Program. Its development objective was to formulate a more appropriate model for planning, implementing and maintaining rural development towards sustainability through community participation and empowerment and to implement it as a learning project of poverty reduction. This pilot started implementation at the end of 1999 in 3 villages and by the end of 2004 it had expanded to cover 30 villages with 8634 poor families.
Gemidiriya Community Driven Development Program paves the way for rural communities to get together, organize formally, plan village development by themselves with 50% women participation mobilizing self help and community contribution. The model focuses on livelihood improvement ensuring reinvestment of savings within the village economy with the understanding that poverty alleviation is not possible unless the root causes of poverty are removed.
The development objective of the 12 year Gemidiriya Program is to enable the rural communities to improve their livelihoods and quality of life.
The objective of the first phase of the first five years is to enable the communities of Uva and Southern Provinces and Ratnapura District of Sabaragamuwa province to build accountable and self-governing local institutions and to manage sustainable investments by : (i) devolving decision making power and resources to community organizations; (ii) strengthening selected local governments which demonstrate responsiveness and accountability to rural communities; (iii) working with federations of village organizations, the private sector and non-governmental organizations(NGOs) on economic empowerment to increase the size and diversity of livelihood options.
