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Background
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ECONET was formed in the year 1993. Initially it was involved in National and international issues related to Forestry and Environment policies. After an extensive Organizational Development (OD) process the team realized the urgency and need to work on local issues impacting the daily life of the marginalized communities. The perspective of Rights and Responsibility based Empowerment also sharpened during this OD process. Out of an intensive field orientation supported by an analytical cerebral exercise the situation analysis of the State of Maharashtra was visualized. Forest Tribal Relationship issues & conflicts, Land ownership disputes were the issues that evolved as a result of this exercise. The affected population with whom ECONET has been working comprises of Tribal, Nomadic and De-notified Tribes, Other Backward Classes and Dalits.
ECONET’s organizational role emerged as providing support for Human and Institutional Development on these issues and creates legal literacy to equip the partner (implementing) organizations to address the above issues effectively. The approach adopted by ECONET is to create leadership through working on Development perspectives and Soft skills at various levels. From the understanding created based on our work on legal analysis and experiences in implementation of legislations we also engage with State and National level Governance systems. We facilitate Networking processes at the grassroots and to evolve mechanisms for amplifying the voices of the people emerging through the networks at mezzo and macro spaces. At present ECONET is facilitating two networks comprising of grassroots organizations on the issues of Tribal-Forest relationship issues with a focus on NTFP and Land Rights. Efforts are going on to design a facilitation process for a network of NGO’s, Peoples Organization working on issues affecting Nomadic and De-notified Tribes. During this first phase a bouquet of organizations were supported and capacitated, some of whom also are part of the issue based networks ECONET facilitates.
Vision
Support empowerment of the marginalised peoples through a socio-enviro-legal approach, by facilitating the creation of a collective response and a critical mass of interventions.
Objectives
Econet is a support organization that believes in the following principles:
- Strengthening local leadership and developing community based human potentials
- Facilitating empowerment processes through perspective building and training
- Inculcating a rights based orientation in ourselves, our partners, and our corresponding responsibilities.
- Facilitating collective action and creating a space for reflection.