Maruranau, Shea, Rupanau, Sandcreek, Shulinab in Region 9, South/Central Rupununi are among the most recent villages where discussions were held on the Ministry of Indigenous Peoples’ Affairs MoIPA much touted Sustainable Development Framework Agreement.

According to a release, the Ministry is receiving considerable support from Conservation International Guyana C.I for this initiative which seeks to outfit villages with a framework aimed at ensuring they are strategically positioned on a sustainable developmental path.

Staff from the Ministry and C.I returned from the Rupununi over the weekend following a week long discussion with the villages.

Project Coordinator in the Ministry of Indigenous Peoples’ Affairs Jude Da Silva during a village meeting in Sand Creek on Thursday reiterated the need for communities to become more accountable and self-sufficient hence the drive in this regard.

“It is important that the village councils have the community development plan so coordination as well as coordination from NGO’s is important …. so this policy that we have will bring all the stakeholders together so we can see how the money you would receive can be best used or can coordinate the best kind of investment”, Da Silva said.

Under the Sustainable Development Framework villages will be required to produce a long term (10-year) Community Development Plan (CDP), where programmatic areas will be outlined, projects and targets prioritize based on the respective CDP’s coupled with an effective feedback mechanism.

A number of villages in Region 9 have successfully completed their long term plan and according to C.I’s Community Development Assistant Kayla de Freitas “work will soon begin on completing their Annual Village Plans AVP’s which will be extracted from plans outlined in the CDP to be implemented during the coming year.”

Villages will have to submit their proposal to the MoIPA by May of every year together with a proposal for funding. The same timeline will be instituted for projects that are to be submitted to any other government agencies.

Technical Coordinator for C.I’s Livelihood Enhancement Project in the Rupununi Rene Edwards emphasized the need for the implementation of such mechanisms aimed at improving the social and economic livelihood within village economies.

“What has happened over time things have changed and things continue to change one of the big changes that we have had is the introduction of cash/money into the way of life of village economies which is made up of different parts. What we have seen is that the customary part that remains strong which includes your land, languages, traditional practices, culture and your own laws and institution, we don’t want to disrupt that but to build on these things and what you want to be and where you see yourselves going in the future and how you want to do it and how you can manage the change that is happening here,” Edwards emphasized.

When the program was launched early last month Vice President and Minister of Indigenous Sydney Allicock stressed that this policy framework will ensure efficient and effective financial and technical support directed to the villages for social, economic and cultural development.

Minister Allicock said “we cannot allow this to continue so there must be a system that will help to alleviate the problem and hence the Sustainable Development Agreement Framework which we hope can rectify most if not all of these short comings.”

He added that that “villages will be in a position to know what their annual priority projects are and send it to the Ministry and the REO in time to be placed into the Ministry and RDC’s Annual Budgets.”

To date more than thirty villages in Region 9 were engaged and similar exercises are scheduled for Parikwarinawa, St. Ignatius, Moco Moco, Nappi, Yupukari and Katoka shortly.

Discussions will be held in Mainstay/Whyaka in Region 2 next weekend. Late last year the Ministry began formulating the Sustainable Development Framework Agreement which aims to create viable economies within villages and communities.