Community Development Project: National Solidarity Programme (NSP)

Background and Objectives

Background

Women CDC Meeting

After two decades of war, Afghanistan's governance system has been weakened. In response, the Government of Afghanistan and UN-HABITAT have designed the National Solidarity Programme (NSP) which is initially aimed at strengthening the network of some 30,000 self-governing community institutions. The NSP has three objectives in empowering communities: (i) re-establishing relations between government and rural communities; (ii) providing grants for the reconstruction of physical and social infrastructure; and (iii) empowering communities and establishing community-level governance structures.

Objectives

UN-HABITAT is one of the Facilitating Partners for the NSP funded by the Government of Afghanistan and World Bank. Community Development Councils (CDC) are mobilized to prepare Community Action Plans and UN-HABITAT provides technical support for the development and implementation of these plans. Components include roads, drains, schools, health facilities and irrigation. The CDC forms an important part of local governance and the interaction between communities and District level administration. UN-HABITAT has been operating in 47 districts of 9 provinces with operations in 3,258 communities.

Activities

The National Solidarity Programme is implemented in five phases:
* Undertaking community awareness-raising and problem identification;
* Establishing Community Development Councils. Council members are voted in through secret ballot and must be aged above 20 years. Each elected member represents 28 eligible voters;
* Preparing and endorsing a Community Development Plan and setting up a Community Savings Box;
* Preparing designs for community projects and submitting proposals;
* Implementing projects including monitoring, evaluation and reflective project learning.

Results (2009)

* A total of 3,258 communities (670,380 families, 3.8 million people) have participated in the NSP;
* 7,250 infrastructure and human capital development community-led sub-projects have been completed;
* Provided considerable capacity development support to communities through several training;
* To the approved sub-projects USD 144 million has been disbursed to the communities;
* Prepared Social Mobilization Training Manual for 5 phases, learning encounter training material, training material on conflict transformation training and engineering training materials for the engineers;
* Due to the closing of the Project, 1,856 matured communities have been handed over to the Government.

Development Partners / Partners

Development Partners: Government of Afghanistan, World Bank
Partners: Ministry of Rural Rehabilitation and Development (MRRD); Provinces of Kandahar, Farah, Herat, Bamyan, Parwan, Kapisa, Balkh, Panjshir, Nangarhar

related links :

• Cutting Ribbons to Start New Lives (PDF 104KB)