Community Development Network (CDN):

It is a partners network, about 35-50 partner NGOs mostly from Sindh and Punjab provinces regularly participate in the meetings. As the venue is rotated among partners there is the opportunity to understand each others work and share the developments. Increasing link up, understanding of each others work and supporting it, strengthening joint advocacy in influencing policy and understanding some larger issues and solutions are the dynamics of the process. Besides updates on partners works, several new participating organizations introduce their work. Increasing participation of women and youths has been observed. The 29 th CDN meeting was held in April'11, in Jampur, about 30 partner organizations and some others attended. As many partners are involved in the flood rehabilitation work, each shared their experiences and the lessons learnt. Women saving groups also held their network meeting. The 30 th CDN meeting scheduled to be held in Shahdadpur- Sanghar in Sept’11 was postponed due to the latest devastating floods in the district. The meeting will now be held in Karachi by Dec’11. Last period the Youth Network held its 2 nd meeting in Batagram hosted by partner BDO. 33 youths from 19 organisations attended

Asia Groups Sharing and the savings initiative:

A new process “The Regional Sharing and Community Activists Exposure” has been initiated, sponsored by the Slum Dwellers International (SDI). Since March’09 the 1 st, 2 nd and 3 rd meetings were held in Nepal, while the 4 th meeting was held in Feb’10 in Colombo SriLanka. NGO members and many community activists from SPARC,NSDF,MM,SDI – India, SEVA, SEVANATHA, Women Bank Federation, Janarakula, SDI – Sri Lanka, Lumanti and its partners - Nepal, and OPP-RTI,OPP-OCT and its partners – Pakistan, with interested groups from Phillipines have come together. In July’11 as part of the process a learning/support visit was made to “Lumanti” in Kathmundu Nepal.OPP-RTI, partners and community activists have been motivated by the many women activists (of the SDI network) attending the meeting and their savings program. So here too participation of women in the CDN and the Asia group sharing meetings is being focused. Strengthening of existing, mostly, womens savings groups and mobilizing new ones is becoming a part of OPP-RTI and some of its partners work. In addition to the saving groups of school owners which are part of the education program, some existing groups and new, mostly women and youth, saving groups have been mobilized in Karachi, (also by partners ASG, CHS&L-gp-1, TTRC, ARM, DF and WADA), Lahore (by partner Muawin) and in DG Khan (by partner GDO). More groups are being mobilized. Documentation of the groups is in progress. In the 24 groups 791 members (statistics corrected) have saved total Rs.1.575 million. To facilitate the coming together, meetings of the saving groups are held at OPP-RTI as well as parallel to the CDN meetings.