World Bank funds Gemi Diriya II

Irangika Range

The Government is determined to completely eradicate poverty implementing a second phase of the Gemi Diriya inter village development program with funds of Rs.8 billion provided by the World Bank.

Speaking at the launch of a CD on software for mapping development indicators and a Grama Niladhari Division level database on proxy poverty indicators in Colombo yesterday, Gemi Diriya Community Development and Livelihood Improvement Project Director, Dr.Gamini Batuwitage said the funds will be utilized for rural development and livelihood improvement in the Uva, Sabaragamuva, Southern and North Central provinces.

With the aim of developing the country through building up the village, a number of poverty eradication programs will be carried out in the Grama Niladhari (GN) Divisions to benefit the people. Therefore, the poverty maps are very useful in planning poverty eradication programs.

Finance and State Revenue Minister Ranjith Siyambalapitiya said that the poverty rate in Sri Lanka has declined from 22.7 percent in 2002 to 15 percent in 2006. With the implementation of Mahinda Chinthanaya policies, the Government is fully committed to the total eradication of poverty implementing a number of development projects in the country. Following these state programs, the poverty level is expected to further decline once the next census would evaluated in 2011,” he said.

The Minister said that the CD is a planning tool which would be useful for planners and decision makers to streamline the poverty eradication projects.

The CD which was launched yesterday will be very useful in planning poverty eradication programs.

It is possible to identify the small areas for which priority should be given in poverty eradication programs by using poverty maps.

The Government has already identified 119 Divisional Secretariat Divisions to be developed shortly by using these mapping development indicators and the GN division level database.

Poverty statistics at lower level administrative units such as Grama Niladhari Divisions are required for preparing poverty maps. However, sample surveys enable an estimation of statistics only at levels above district due to limitations in sample sizes.

The Department of Census and Statistics has conducted a special study and introduced a proxy indicator for poverty, called Unsatisfied Basic Needs Index (UBNI). The values of UBNI have been estimated for GN divisions. The Department has prepared a database at GN division level and this database contains values of the UBNI and indicators that have been used to derive UBNI.