PESHAWAR, Feb 11: The NWFP government would develop union council level profile to promote the internationally accepted concept of community participation at the grass roots level to ensure need-based development activities and effective development planning, according to sources.
The idea to develop this profile and involve masses in the development planning of their area concerned is, at present, being implemented under a pilot project in the districts of Hangu and Mardan.
Under a combined effort, the United Nations Children's Fund (Unicef) and Integrated Regional Development Programme (IRDP) are assisting the provincial government in introducing Community Information System (CIS) in the two districts on an experimental basis following which the same model would be replicated in the remaining 22 districts of the province.
The CIS envisaged community-based initiatives to promote decisions for collective actions - based on evidence - and involve community in development planning at the district level.
The establishment of CIS is already being pursued in the Hangu and Mardan districts where the IRDP, in collaboration with Unicef, launched a pilot project in the last quarter of the 2001-02 financial year.
"CIS would serve the basic purpose of empowering the masses and letting them be the masters of their destiny as enshrined under the devolution of power plan introduced in August 2001," said a development planner.
The project of establishing CIS, said the sources, involved three components comprising carrying out assessment, conducting analysis and proposing action to serve the broad objective of streamlining the development process across the province by introducing bottom-up approach under which the community would determine their development needs and propose actions to pursue the goals.
Under a similar move, Unicef had assisted the provincial government in establishing 'district citizen information centre' (DCIC) in Mardan to help the district government develop a comprehensive data base, profile of the entire district, socio-economic indicators, geographic information system, administrative setup of the district, human resources and other details about the districts, the sources said.
Mardan's DCIC, to be replicated in other 23 districts of the province, would correlate information and spread it across various departments working at the provincial, district, tehsil and union council levels for planning purposes and other official business.
While the DCIC would be functioning at the district level, each of the union council would be having its own CIS (community information system). "CIS would eventually augment the DCIC by feeding it with the regularly updated information and changes taking place at the union council level," said the development planner, adding that "this is expected to create a credible information hub which would facilitate well-directed development and prompt utilization of financial resources".
Under the assessment component of the pilot CIS project in Hangu and Mardan districts, staff of the contracted non-governmental organizations, social organizers, Nazims of union councils, councillors, secretaries of union councils and village activists would be trained for collecting data.