Kerala's all-women self-help group to train Uganda women

Thiruvananthapuram: Kerala's all-women self-help group Kudumbashree is getting ready to impart entrepreneurial skill training to rural women in Uganda.

Volunteers of Kudumbashree, the poverty eradication mission by the state government, were invited to help women launch profitable ventures in the agricultural sector of that country, Kudumbashree officials here said.

The group would impart a 10-day training to make rural women equip to start farming and various farming-based initiatives, they said.

The state self-help group was roped in after a 26-member team from different countries visited Kerala under the aegis of the National Institute of Agricultural Extension Management at Hyderabad and the US Agency for International Development last March, they said.

Kudumbashree Executive Director S Harikishore said the team comprised members from Afghanistan, Ghana, Uganda, Liberia, Keniya and Kudumbashree imparted them training in various aspects of entrepreneurship.

"Kudumbashree is invited as part of Uganda's plan to replicate our various women empowerment programmes in the social and economic sectors there," he said.

Various initiatives imparted by Kudumbashree in the agricultural sector including the production and distribution of value-added products, the significance of forming a consortium of entrepreneurs and innovative thoughts regarding farming would find a place in the training sessions, the official said.

Launched in 1998 as a poverty eradication mission by the state government to wipe out poverty through community action, Kudumbashree has tried its hand in various fields, ranging from pickle-making to IT business to empowering women households in the state.

The network now has 43 lakh members across the state.