Poverty Reduction: Self-help Group Strategy

Rural development paradigms and poverty reduction strategies have been evolving over time on the basis of emerging theoretical insights and implementation experiences. The Government of Andhra Pradesh has adopted ‘a model of participatory development with social mobilization and capacity-building of the poor as the supporting planks for poverty reduction in all its dimensions.’ With Janmabhoomi as an anchor, the self-help group movement has received an immense impetus in the recent past. In addition to women SHGs, self-help groups in the sphere of natural resources management and human development initiatives are promoted in a big way. Thus, water users associations (WUAs), watershed committees (WCs), vanasamrakshna smithies (VSs), school education committees (SECs) and mothers’ groups have come into existence in large numbers as community-based organizations (CBOs) to promote self-help, participation and collective responsibility. Andhra Pradesh contributing to poverty reduction in different contours. The book depicts the operations of these self-help groups engaged in the domain of income-generation, human development, environmental protection and natural resources management. The study is based on strong empirical data of primary and secondary nature besides macro analysis of the self-help groups based on state-wide data. The book is the outcome of extensive study of the working of women self-help groups in Mahaboobnagar District and presents case studies of some self-help groups in Chittoor District. Thus, it provides an in-depth analysis of the evolution, performance, problems and perspective of self-help groups. Further, it delves into the socio-economic impact of these self-help groups on poverty reduction and its manifestation in women’s empowerment. The inherent variations in the structure and functioning among the different self-help groups and the causes of such variations are also narrated with supporting cases, and key inputs from the stakeholders to strengthen the movement have been suggested.