President Kalam moot 'One Village One Product' for tribal betterment

B R Hills, Karnataka, Oct 15 (UNI) President A P J Abdul Kalam today mooted adoption of developing of 'One Village One Product' through which village wise products, with technology added could be made into a competitive commercial product for national and international market.

Speaking at the Silver Jubilee Celebration of Vivekananda Girijana Kalyana Kendra (VGKK) on this eserene hills of backward Chamarajanagar District he said time had come to develop village based products, especially from tribal hamlets like about 128 of those which were in the B R Hills area. This could bring a revolutionary change in the tribal economy that had suffered since long due to non availability of expertise and modern methods.

Mentioning the handicraft promotion work taken up in Chhindwara and Senoi in Madhya Pradesh governmental and JETRO of Japan, he said development of interior life style articles was taking place with the help of Japanese technical experts. After value addition the products were sent to international market.

A similar model had been followed between Thailand and Japan and this should be adopted in B R Hills as well to develop 'one village one product' that can transform the lives of poor tribals, he said.

''In order to commence this type of handicrafts product mission, people in B R Hills should embark on Planning Commission supported 'Bamboo Mission' for development of banboo products, which was available in abundance in the area. This mission envisaged integrated programme of expansion of plantations of Bamboo species, the scientific management, and promotion of community level value addition and entrepreneurship,'' he said.

This mission, which could bring about large employment generation and benefit small entrepreneur, should aim at creating international market for banboo products. VGKK should work with institutions like National Institute of Design, IIMs, industrial houses and the banking systems to generate number of Bamboo enterprises in different PURA clusters of BR Hills, Mr Kalam said.

UNI BSP RS SP HT1555