The Importance of National Policies

Nowadays, Urbanization and globalization concepts are very significant talks in this world. Thus, in National Policies, implementation is very important aspect to carry out their activities effectively. Further, due to the increasing development activities and revisits the weaknesses, limitations and lapses in past policies in Government national development policies implementation, these are very important in the comparison of rural development performance between national policies and Government mechanism.

Here, National Policies are main key players of Government mechanism and those policies stimulate the rural economic development and growth of rural economic. Hence, nowadays various types of NGOs, INGOs want to implement in rural areas and to increase more development activities. Further, government institutions help to finding the development difficulties also. Therefore it is important that the measurement of the comparison of the rural development positioning of the national policies which implemented in Sri Lanka. Through this research, we can find out the degree of rural development activities of national government policies in order to compare the performance of those policies.

National Policies was introduced by Canadian Conservative Party for economic development in 1876 and put into action in1979 [1] .Then other countries also follow these policies to uplift their countries’ economic development. These policies consider Rural Development actions which mostly aim at the social and economic development of the area. These programs are usually top-down the local or regional authorities, regional development agencies, NGOs, national governments or international development organizations. But then, local populations can also bring about endogenous initiatives for development. The term is not limited to the issues for developing countries. In fact many of the development countries have very active rural development programs. The main aim of the national policies is to develop the undeveloped villages. To develop a country not only industrialization is sufficient but also the every common has to survive.

Sri Lanka’s national policies are being reoriented under the stewardship of the United People’s Freedom Alliance (UPFA) Government, aimed at acceleration of economic growth with special consideration given to pro-poor growth strategies [2] . The development strategy consolidates positive elements of the national policies followed over the past two decades and revisits the weaknesses, limitations and lapses in past policies in order to ensure equitable development in the country.

2.0 Background of the research study

2.1 Objective of the Study

The objective of the research study is to find out the degree of the rural development positioning of the national policies in order to compare the performance of those policies.

From this, the research will attempt to

Identify the factors which are influencing on national policy performance of Government.

Identifying if there is any significant disparity between rural development and its impact on the national policy performance.

Identifying and analyzing factors that lead rural development nonperformance and also providing suggestions to make a better choice of national policy performance.

Identifying the factors which are influencing on the effective rural development of national policy.

2.2 Significance of the Study

The National policies of rural development are implemented by Government mechanism in rural areas; so, we must measure the performance, development trend, risk, and rural people reaction of the national policies’ implementation. In this, way we can find out the policies’ performance to the society and country. This will benefit to the government through the measurement and comparison of the national policies’ performance of rural development.

The National policies will be planned government’s future effective development activities.

The government can formulate the national development strategies in national policies.

They can plan has to attract the rural people in order to achieve their goals.

So, this comparison also helps to the society to predict that in which government implement their development policies and how to increase their development performance. A government can decide that how to achieve the development target from national policies in creative way to motivate its organizations.

2.3 Over View of the National Policies [3] 

Here the researcher considers the Objectives of the national policies and their activities. The main objective of the formation of this National Policies are to amalgamate all the poverty alleviation projects implemented by several line government organizations at regional and rural level under Government Mechanism and implement such rural development projects with proper resource management and co-ordination to achieve productive development in the country. The wide scope of responsibilities assigned to the National Policies includes major national development programs implemented island wide as well as projects implemented at regional level. Main national level programs include the Gama Neguma, Jathika Saviya, Decentralized Budget, Samurdhi Scheme.

2.3.1Rural Development Policies

In spite of the fact that all the development programs implemented during the last five decades accommodated ‘Rural Development’ Programs and Projects, anticipated development in the village could not be achieved, main reasons being the formulation of programs at national level, inadequate attention and financial provision to rural problems, absence of community participation in village development and inefficient project implementation. Lack of adequate Rural Development Policy was the main reason for this situation. The self-sufficient village existed before the foreign invasions gradually headed to disaster due to the ill-conceived and inadequate rural development policies and strategies implemented after the foreign invasions and also subsequent independence. The poverty level in the rural areas and the plantation sector gradually increased.

The present Government having realized this situation introduced the Island wide National Program called ‘Gama Neguma’ concentrating on the rural community [4] . The Island-wide national development achieving through the construction of an economically prosperous village consisting of a principled society upholding ethical values can be regarded as the national policy objective of this program.

Specific objectives

Creation of a harmonious, good and healthy society through cultivating social and cultural qualities in the community.

Conversion of the village community to stakeholders of the development process and its benefits by entrusting the village community, the right of decision making with regard to the development of their own village and the responsibility of implementing appropriate projects.

Creation of a self-sufficient village by generating employment through making available economic and social facilities to the villagers enabling them to find their daily needs within the village itself.

Strategies

Complete development in the village by implementing programs under three major components of fulfilling moral/social development, creating opportunities for generation of livelihoods and construction of infrastructure facilities in the village.

In addition to the provisions made available by the Ministry of Nation Building, co-ordinate all other development activities carried out in the village by other line Ministries, provincial and Local Government Authorities, private sector and non-governmental organizations.

Assure active co-operation of all stake holders such as rural community, state officials and local political authority in the implementation of Projects.

Gradual transformation of the village to be the centre of development by unearthing the village’s potentialities and allocating financial resources through a period of several years.

2.3.2Policies pertaining to poverty Alleviation

Even though the poverty level of the Island as a whole has declined as shown in the statistical data of the Department of Census and Statistics, it is seen that poverty lines of the Rural Sector and Plantation Sector when taken separately are at a higher level. In spite of income per-capita being high, majority of the rural community still live in poverty while the poverty. In the plantation sector has reached alarmingly higher levels during the last several years. The benefits accrued through efforts hitherto made for alleviation of poverty have not reached the rural and plantation sectors and the lower strata of population. It is therefore necessary to implement specific pro-poor programs to minimize such discrepancies. The Gama Neguma Program, in spite of its direct contribution towards minimizing poverty of rural community, alone is not sufficiently geared to minimize the poverty. The Samurdhi Relief Program plays a vital role in this direction. It is implemented to ensure minimum dependent level of the poorest of the poor.

Specific Policy Objectives

Ensure minimum dependent level of poorest.

Provision of sustainable livelihoods to upgrade the standard of living of the poor and to achieve economic empowerment.

Strategies

Implementation of relief programs for the families living below the poverty line.

Nutrition programs for pregnant and lactating mothers in poor families.

In addition to above relief measures, provision of Infrastructure facilities, Capital, Technology, Consultancy, Guidance and Marketing facilities by the Government to direct them towards sustainable livelihoods.

Encourage private investments, introduction of credit schemes and creating public awareness about existing credit schemes. Implementation of such special projects for poorest families with Government’s intervention.

Avoid duplication and ensure maximum productive usage of the resources through the co-ordination of pro-poor programs implemented in the rural areas with financial assistance made available by the other line Ministries, Provincial Councils and Local Government agencies and Non-Governmental organizations.

Allow and facilitate the rural community to plan, implement and supervise their own development programs.

2.3.3Gama Neguma (Village Upliftment Program) [5] 

Gama Neguma is a new concept for rural upliftment and village re-awakening in Sri Lanka introduced with a view to bring about an accelerated development for the rural Sri Lanka by National Policies framework. Despite the different rural development approaches taken place over the past 60 years of post-independence era, no significant progress has been achieved to bring about a change in lifestyle of rural masses to acceptable levels.

Objectives

To ensure community participation by motivation, organization and community empowerment for self-reliance based on total development of the rural community.

To introduce a formal mechanism for participatory decision makes and project planning.

To obtain optimum benefits from development program and to implement integrated village development plans to avoid duplication.

Development Strategy

The under mentioned methods are used as basic strategy for village development programs under ‘Gama Neguma’

To prepare integrated village development plans with community participation targeting all development efforts to achieve a common objective.

To make opportunities for the rural community to participate actively in their economic, social, cultural and moral development efforts.

To organize and empower rural community to ensure their total commitment and contribution in the development process

To pool all resources utilized in village development and implement productive, transparent integrated village development plans for proper coordination at village and divisional level,

To transform the rural community to a group of activities with ideological and comparative thinking abilities and enhance self determination by developing their abilities and skills demand for sustainable development dependent on self reliance, while changing the subsistent mentality with an orientation towards achieving targets.

Simultaneous Rural Livelihood Development with infrastructure development for economic resurgence and social development.

2.4 Identifying the problem of the research

It can be defined as National Policy that affects Rural Development”

I. What factors affect national policy in rural development?

ii. To what extent, rural development is determined performance of national policy?

2.5 Hypotheses of the research

Based on the assumed casual relationship given in the following conceptual model, the following hypotheses are developed for testing

H1:- National Policy on Rural Development will not lead to higher development Performance.

H2:- National Policy on Rural Development will lead to higher development performance.

2.6 Limitations

There are may be some limitations in any study and no expectation in this study also.

It was impossible to get fully relevant and accurate data on information from the source.

The identified limitations are.

Annual report and other statistical reports are released by Government. So, it is not independent data.

Due to the time limitation the analysis part has not been gone in depth. As far as this study is concerned these are the perceived limitations.

This research considers the rural areas which are situated in lack of facilitated areas.

Interview method is not considered in this study. Therefore, fresh information of rural development cannot be acquired from rural people in this research.

This study will be taken only national policy that affects rural development. But other factors also make influence on rural development. (e.g. Government financial background, Rural People activities, and etc)

2.7 Research methodology

In a lack of rural developed areas, rural development performance and national policies implementation are vital issues. Rural development performance of national policies has positive impact on government organizational performance. In this study, rural development performance of national policies that is government mechanism, and their level of performance are measured. The relationship between rural development performance of national policies and national policies’ implementation is measured by using statistical techniques.

2.8 Conceptualization

Conceptualization is important to form a frame work when understanding any analysis. It is better to obtain the result through this frame work. Then it is easy to find out the relationship among them. The conceptual model clearly depicts the pattern of relationship among key variables. In this way, this analysis caused a relationship between national policies and their rural development performance to form a conceptualization model. Further national policies’ performance can also be connected with government organizations’ efficiencies and effectiveness.

2.9 Methodology

The methodology is used to analyze the relationship among variables and their predictable pattern.

SWOT analysis (Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities and Threats analysis)

This research is a qualitative method in this research, based on researcher’s observation and responses from national policy on rural development performance.

Correlation analysis

This technique is used to find out the relationship among the variables and their strength. This is a quantitative technique; therefore, two variables such as independent variable and dependent variable are taken in this study.

Independent variable – National Policy implement of Government

Dependent variable – Rural Development Performance

X – Independent variables

Y – Dependent variables

r – Co – efficient correlation

Pearson Co-efficient of correlation

r =

n∑XY – ∑X∑Y

√(n∑X2 – (∑X)2).(n∑Y2 – (∑Y)2)

The coefficient of correlation (r) takes the value from +1 to -1 (including plus one and minus one) Therefore the correlation Coefficient expresses the following relationship.

Positive perfect relationship +1

Negative perfect relationship -1

Moderate relationship +0.5 or – 0.5

Strong relationships +0.9 or – 09

Weak relationships +0.1 or – 0. l

No correlations 0

In this research, in order to find out the relationship between these two variables Pearson co-efficient of correlation is used. On this equation at co-efficient of correlation following symbols are used.

Percentage Analysis

This method is used to find out the percentage and to express their trend about rural development standing of national policies’ performance which is affected by certain factors.