Welcome!

SEDS, the Social Education and Development Society, was founded in 1980 by Rajen Joshua and Manil Jayasena as a grassroots development NGO, motivated by the desire to help the poorest of the poor in the drought-prone area of Anantapur District in Andhra Pradesh. In the early days, the main focus of the work was on community development by way of non-formal education and small loans to skilled target communities like cobblers, basket weavers, blanket weavers and others.

As Anantapur is the second most drought prone area in India and much of its natural resources are depleted, it soon became clear that environmental problems would have to be tackled first, if peoples’ livelihoods were to be made sustainable. Starting in 10 villages near the small town of Penukonda a scheme of pioneering work was developed which aimed to empower local communities and improve their environment. Initially small nurseries were started for homestead plantations and planting of avenue trees along village roads. Re-a-forestation and more sustainable agricultural practices were introduced. From 1990, SEDS started using a more participatory approach, through the formation of Community Based Organizations. Involving the communities more in the effort made them actual stakeholders in the development process of the region. Throughout the years the scope and area of the work increased and the fruits of the sustained efforts became visible in the greener environment and the enthusiasm of the communities.

Today, SEDS is working through an integrated rural development approach with an emphasis on women’s empowerment, watersheds, re-a-forestation and natural resource management. This is within five Mandals in the southern part of Anantapur District, in south western Andhra Pradesh namely, Penukonda, Roddam, Gorantla, Somandepalli and Chilamathur. In these 5 mandals SEDS currently supports 125 villages, being some 12000 women and their families, 980 Self Help Groups (SHGs), 120 Village Organisations (VOs) & 5 Mandal Samakyas (MMSs) .

Through its sustained efforts SEDS has made a significant impact on the lives of the people in the area and the local environment. The SEDS slogan “Towards a greener tomorrow” has become a reality.

Thursday, February 4, 2010

SEDS in the news: A Unique ID Project



A miniature UID project in AP

By N Vasudevan Feb 01 2010 , Bangalore


While Nandan Nilekani is busy with the Unique ID project, a miniature replica has


been implemented successfully by Social Education and Development Society (SEDS), an NGO, in the drought-prone Anantapur district of Andhra Pradesh.

Bangalore-based Wolf Frameworks has developed a software-as-a-service (SaaS) solution — Census Information Management Solution (CIMS) for SEDS. Using this application, SEDS has profiled and generated unique identification numbers for more than 40,000 members in the district.

Manil Jayasena Joshua, CEO, SEDs said, “We rely on data, its relationships and analytics/reports heavily to serve the rural and under developed community effectively. CIMS gave us quick, anytime, anywhere, and secured access.”

SEDS conducts surveys regularly to track real-time population, resource, programme statistics, and a road map of how their programme is working and its resultant success/failure.

The NGO uses Wolf’s solution to collect, relate and consolidate data into a central repository and automates the process of data analysis, presenting reports and charts on different metrics. The application also imports the previous data records maintained in Microsoft Access Databases and spreadsheets.

Sunny Ghosh, director & CEO of Wolf Frameworks said, “CIMS solution demonstrates the ability of our framework to manage thousands of records online and the ease of use with which non-sophisticated users are now able to leverage Wolf cloud computing technologies – OnDemand.”

Ghosh said, “Looking at the scale in which the National UID project is planned, many technologies will be involved that will work together. If there is going to be a strong collaboration perspective, we are open to share our system and technology.”






Source: http://www.mydigitalfc.com/opportunities/miniature-uid-project-ap-002


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