Current Activities

EDUCATION & LITERACY
1. Laying foundation of an equitable society…..Girls Child Education

MVESS believes that for laying the equitable society proper foundation must be laid at the beginning only. This thought got materialized with the assistance of Ministry of Tribal Affairs, GoI which provided assistance to the MVESS in setting up an Residential Educational Complex for providing quality education to the girls of tribals. This project has been implemented in the Mihirpurwa block of Bahraich district since 2001 onwards. It is noteworthy to mention that the literacy rate in among the tribal (Tharus) area was only 12% and girls were earlier engaged in the collection of Non Timber Forest Produce and were providing assistance to other family members in earning some money. Breaking this tradition was not an easy job but with the continuous efforts of MVESS results are overwhelming. During the first year of the programme 30 tribal girls of Tharu tribes were enrolled in the comples in the class I and they were given uniform, books, games, drawing & craft material, medicines and meals support. This was the first intervention of its kind in the most neglected tribal area. However, with the committed efforts of principal, teachers and support staff community developed trust on MVESS and this programme has advanced further. In the second year 30 new girls were enrolled and during the third year of the programme new enrolment is 30. Now the programme is running in its fourth year and total enrollment as on date is 120. Positive feature of the programme is that no girls have dropped since the beginning of the programme. Educational complex has been now recognized among the community as the centre of quality education where through Montessori and Joy Learning principals education is provided to the girls.

2. First Step towards Women Empowerment…… Women Literacy Initiative (AFLP)

MVESS has been working in Mihirpurwa block of Bahraich district U.P., which is one of the poorest areas in the country in terms
of literacy. Literacy rate in the block is as low as 7%, which makes women most vulnerable part of society, and they are treated as mere mechanical devices not physical entities. As a part of Government of India initiative to address the women literacy in this most backward region, MVESS was identified as the partner organisation and it provided functional literacy inputs i.e. 200 Hr. inputs of functional literacy to 62,438 women in the age group of 15-35. Evaluation conducted by GoI showed that more than 85% beneficiaries qualified the literacy norm. Through the tea m of 86 Master Trainers and 3000 Volunteer Trainers this project was implemented in the given time frame of six months.



VOCATIONAL TRAINING AND MICRO ENTERPRISE DEVELOPMENT
3. Empowering Women thorugh Capacity Building…… Vocational Training

Cane Craft Training

In order to economically empower women, skill building support has been provided to 60 women in the age group of 15-35, of rural areas of Sarojini Nagar block of Lucknow. Women have been trained on cane crafts, for which the raw material is locally available and women have inclination to learn finer techniques in this trade. After the training support women are making cane products, which has a good market in the urban areas of Lucknow. MVESS used the help of experienced trainers for capacity building purpose.

Screen Printing Training

60 women in the age group of 15-35 have also been given training on screen printing. These women are now running their own micro enterprise and made them economically empowered.

Fashion Designing Training


25 girls were given training on fashion designing in the rural areas of Unnao district of U.P.




4. A leap in the new era….. Computer Training Initiave

MVESS has been addressing the women empowerment issue at different levels. A leap was made in girls were given computer training. 60 girls in the rural areas of Barabanki district are given training on computer education. This was the intervention of its first kind in that area. In the area which has never seen computer before women training was taken as the welcome step. This has provided opportunity to the girls get employment in the government and private sector.

HEALTH
MVESS has implemented various projects on community health, mother and child care and reproductive care issues.

5. Health Education and Awareness

This is one of the important interventions of the MVESS. It has been providing awareness and capacity building to grass root primary stakeholders on various health issues. During this intervention village level women are imparted information and education through easy communication channels. Through group meetings, community is being made aware about the health issues. Objective of this intervention is to create awareness and behaviour change among women on various aspects of health such as family welfare, immunization, nutrition, balanced diet, reproductive child health and general ailments among women. MVESS has been implemeintg this programme since 2001 and for that purpose it has developed competent team of resource persons, commnity based vol;unteers and reference material. This program has benefitted more than 18,000 persons.

6. Reaching Unserved Areas……. Promotion of Indian System of Medicine

Rural areas of Uttar Pradesh are still unserved for health services. MVESS has been promoting Indian System of Medicines i.e. Yoga, Ayurveda, Unani & Homeopathy in the remote areas of Kanpur district. It has benefited the population of 1.28 lakhs. In this programme total 240 farmers were give training to start growing medicinal plants, community were given inputs for the preparation and preservation of medicines, through health camps of Ayurveda, Unani, and Homeopathy, 80 Practitioners of Indian System of Medicine were given training to start serving the rural areas in a better way, more than 2000 students of 4 Jr. High schools were given inputs of Yoga education and their PT teachers were given training in Yoga.

7. Accessing Health Services……RCH Programme

After obtaining extensive experience in the field of health education, awareness and promotion of indian system of Indian Medicianes, MVESS has expanded its activities in the field of family welfare. This activity started in the year 2000 with the support
of Ministry of Health & Family Welfare, GoI. Under this project population of 50,000 has been benefitted in rural areas of Kanpur distirct. MVESS has promoted family welfare programme among the masses. For that purpose trained commuity health workers are working in field, women groups are being formed which are taking control of health services, children are being immunized, adolescents are being empowered on the health issues. Proper networking has been done with the government health delivery system for providing antal natal care to the pregnant women, lactating women and children below the age of five years. Participation of the community is the main feature of the programme and women health committee have taken control of the program.

Community based health workers have also done the service delivery and they have provided contraceptives and IFA tablets to the eligible couples, pregnant women and to the adolescent girls. One of the innovative feature of the programme was developing functional convergence with the Panchayats. Health Committee of Panchayat are being made active and communty based health workers attend those meetings to build the capacity of panchayat members. Besides this other actors of local self governance viz. Pradhan, BDC members and Block Pramukh are also involved in the programme so as to increase the coverage and to increase the outcome of the programme.

8. Increasing Food Security at Household level and poverty reduction…… Soil Consevaion, Agriculture Extension and Agriculture Diversification.

Shravasti district has been hit by low rainfally during the past few years. Rinfall in the distirct some times become very erratic leaving agriculture production very less. This has resulted in food insecurity at the household level. With the support of DRDA, MVESS has assisted farmers in fighting the drought and has constructed bunds for conserving rain water in the fields to increase the moisture regime in the soils leading to increased agiculture production. This programme has benefitted 200 small and marginal farmers.



Gender in Agriculture….. A women empowerment initiative
As a part of addressing Gender issues MVESS is covering women farmers also in its programmes. Programme has the main objectives of developing women farmer groups and make them capable in the field of agriculture, to create awareness among them about the food protection, to acquaint them about the use of technically suitable agriculture instruments for reducing their constraints out of workload, to make them able resolve gender related issues etc. in the field of agriculture, empowerment of women, to increase ability of gender sensitisation in the area of agriculture etc.




9. Caring Aged…… Day Care Centre for Aged

From 2002 onwards MVESS has started welfare programme and in this direction it has established a Day Care Centre in Barabanki district of U.P. In this centre 150 aged persons are provided recreational support, nutrition and medical care support.