Three-day Northeast Youth NGO Summit got underway at Hotel Acacia, Dimapur with the theme ‘Exchange’ on Tuesday.
Panellists include- Sustainable Development Forum of Nagaland, executive director-Amba Jamir, Bosco Institute, Jorhat Assam, director-Dr Fr Jerry Thomas, Dimapur Deputy Commissioner-Kesonyü Yhome (IAS), Impulse Social Enterprises, Shillong Meghalaya, founder managing director-Hasina Kharbhih and Morung Express editor-Akum Longchari.
In his keynote address, Kesonyü Yhome said, even after six decades since independence, the North East Region (NER) of the country with its population of 45 crore still faced a big challenge in providing basic education, healthcare and subsequent employment for the people.
Adding that wide disparities were evident in the level of development among the NE states, Yhome said even the rich economic resources of the region was not harnessed to its maximum potential which was partly due to the traditional land holding system and the region’s frequent mass agitations and other forms of armed conflicts.
Yhome said, inspite of being confronted with a flow of significant problems NER had been able to scale some heights in the national level over the years and that has in turned projected a competent image for other to witness.
He expressed hope that in that spirit, the ongoing summit of prominent NGOs led by young people of the region would be designed to revisit challenging areas and chart new course of action for the future of the region.
YouthNet founding director-Hekani Jakhalu in a short speech motivated the participating NGOs to be centred more on work than fund and also prove themselves through their works before looking for sponsors.
Earlier the inaugural programme was hosted by Vitono Gugu Haralu while welcome address was delivered by CAN Youth chief functionary Jenpu Rongmei.
A multimedia presentation was done by CAN Youth while Zoommax 2013 solo winner Abeni Odyuo gave a performance. In a letter to the organizers, CAN Youth Society from the Raj Bhavan, Nagaland Governor, PB Acharya expressed happiness for the Summit.
He congratulated the Society for carrying out noble voluntary mission to empower youth especially the poor and the helpless by giving them ‘hope for tomorrow’ through vocational and skill trainings, social support and most importantly ‘transforming of our Naga society through Youth Empowerment’.
He added that North East being the gate way to our neighbouring ASEAN countries, has all the required potential and manpower and it would be best suited to be a commercial corridor of India which can only be achieved if we facilitate development in true sense.
Acharya said, imparting skill development to the youth will facilitate employment through various missions undertaken by the Central Government like Make in India, Digital India and also banking schemes like the Pradhan Mantri MUDRA Bank Yojana which provides financial loans to encourage entrepreneurship in the country and that will broaden North East horizons in the real of entrepreneurship. He wished all the participants of the Summit for a more cooperative and rational dialogue.