Our Correspondent|1 March 2020
Cross River State Ministry of International Development at the weekend attended the Special Funds Management and Implementation review meeting for the Community and Social Development Project (CSDP) to foster development in the State.
The Cross River State Commissioner for International Development, Dr Inyang Asibong, who was the only Commissioner invited to the meeting consequent upon the State's track record of being the leading State in implementation in South-South, Nigeria, opined that the CSDP is a Community Driven Development (CDD) program focused on building and rebuilding social and natural resource infrastructure services at the community level.
Dr. Asibong said the Governor Ben Ayade led administration is working assiduously to enhance the social capital status quo of the State, and the CSDP is one way to achieving this.
“The CSDP is very strategic as it lays emphasis on gender, the vulnerable and internally displaced persons, making it the core future direction of interventions. We have episodes of these three items in the State, which is why we have our hands on the plough to ensure development across board.”
The World Bank Task Team Lead, Prof. Foluso Okunmadewa, who was full of praises for the Cross State Government said the deliverables from the event includes mechanisms to develop, implement and monitor micro social and natural resources infrastructure projects across the State while Mr. Fidel Udie, the General Manager, CSDA, asserted that the CSDP will also strengthen the skills and capacity of LGAs and MDAs to support communities across State and build relationships between them.
From wooing bilateral and multilateral partnerships to boost Agriculture, human capital development and rural power supply, to attracting AfDB funding for community development and collaborating with UNFPA and UNICEF to combat all forms of abuse against women and the girl child in the state, Cross River State has been on series of community development interventions across all sectors through the Ministry of International Development and Donor Cooperation.
