Recent projects

The Praxis Programme was launched by INTRAC in April 2003 and is funded by the Dutch Foreign Ministry for four years. Praxis catalyses the sharing of experiences and supports the development of innovative practices in the field of organisational capacity building. The resulting reflection and analysis is disseminated through practitioner-oriented publications, a dynamic website, as well as seminars and conferences. To support this process, Praxis engages with practitioners, academics and decision makers around critical issues in organisational capacity building, with a particular emphasis on networking with civil society support providers and local practitioners in developing and transitional societies.

Initiated by the Tajik government and supported by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the local Women in Development bureau is providing assistance to rural women through training and micro-credits. According to the World Bank, over 60 percent of Tajikistan's population lives below the national poverty line and the average monthly salary is little over US $20. Observers say that the poverty level in rural areas is even higher.

In an effort to tackle the issue, UNDP launched its micro-credits programme in 1997 for rural women. The project is aimed at promoting rural entrepreneurship and working on the issue of unemployment and sustainable livelihoods.

UNDP's programme on community development in Tajikistan is currently working in 30 districts of the former Soviet republic and has distributed loans worth some $3 million, with around 40,000 beneficiaries, of whom some 30 percent are women.