Bhopal, July 4: Technical training pertaining to finance, administration and forestry is being imparted to members of Van Samitis under World Bank-funded Community Forest Management Project in 12 districts of Madhya Pradesh. The objective of the project is to extend financial assistance to Van Samitis to run small and medium industries apart from coordination in employment-oriented schemes.

The cost of World Bank-funded Japan Social Development Fund Grant for Capacity Building for Community Forest Management is about Rs eight crore 50 lakh, which is being received in the form of grant. The project, which is being implemented in Seoni, Chhindwara, Burhanpur, Sidhi, Chhatarpur, Raisen, Dewas, Jhabua, Mandla, Ratlam, Ujjain and Sheopur Kalan districts, would run up to February 2009. So far, funds amounting to Rs two crore 85 lakh have been spent under the scheme.

So far, training has been imparted to 1091 Samiti members, secretaries and spearhead teams of 200 Van Samitis of the 12 districts at Balaghat Forest School while during the second phase, which was held at the forest division level, 6200 more Van Samiti members were trained. The work of establishing Inter-department Coordination has already been accomplished in Seoni district. Now this process would be taken up in other districts also. Under this project, 635 persons were taken on tour.

Small and medium industrial projects have been prepared by the selected consultants for 60 Samitis in Chhindwara, Seoni, Mandla, Raisen, Ratlam, Ujjain, Jhabua, Dewas and Burhanpur and the same are about to be implemented soon. Consultants for the rest of the districts including Sidhi, Chhatarpur and Sheopur Kalan have been selected and work has been started by them.