In furtherance of Ondo State Government's vision to intensify more efforts on rural development and extension services, the State Governor, Arakunrin Oluwarotimi Akeredolu, SAN, on Wednesday presented cheques of a total sum of N516million to second set of 37 communities and 13 vulnerable groups.

This is to enable the beneficiaries to kick-start the implementation of their self-help and empowerment projects, respectively, under the Community and Social Development Project Additional Financing (CSDPAF).

It will be recalled that Akeredolu's administration presented cheques with the total sum of N167million to the first set of 19 communities for the similar purpose in the year 2017.

Speaking at the event held at the International Centre for Culture and Events (The Dome) in Akure, the Governor said this was in line with the unwavering determination of his administration to run an inclusive government, which according to him, involves every citizen and resident of the state in its development plan.

Akeredolu, represented by the Deputy Governor, Hon. Agboola Ajayi, lauded the state Community and Social Development Agency, saying its has lived up to expectation of facilitating the people to utilise their innate intelligence and indigenous capacity to drive development in the state most especially in the rural areas.

His words, "We appreciate the fact that the Community and Social Development Project utilises the bottom-up community Driven Development approach in its project implementation strategy, involving the projects' end users, particularly in its identification through the participatory Rural Appraisal, a platform for grassroots policy dialogue, implementation and taking ownership of the projects.

"Our administration will not relent in abridging the wide socio-ecomomic gap between the hinterlandsand urban centres as real development can only be actualised and accentuated through the active symbiosis between the two, an understanding predicated on collaboration and coexistence designed for amity and progress

"Let me commend the Special Adviser and the Ondo State Community and Social Development Agency (ODCSDA) for facilitating and impacting into the the lives of inhabitants of 142 communities across the three senatorial districts of the state with 361 projects to date".

In his welcome address, the Special Adviser on Rural and Community Development to the Governor, Rt.Hon. Victor Olabimtan, said ODCSDA was one of the 27 states including FCT participating in CSDP fully certified by the World Bank to operate in the CSDP Additional Financing phase.

Olabimtan noted that the World Bank-assited programme was to improve access to services of human development, while the project developmental objective was to support empowerment of communities and local government authorities for increased access by the poor to improved social and natural resources infrastructure services in a sustainable manner.

He however stressed that CSDP has contributed significantly in achieving the target set by this administration regarding her JMPPR priority policies.