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Dimapur, June 13 (EMN): The Kohima Smart City Development Limited (KSCDL) and the Kohima Municipal Council (KMC) signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with World Resources Institute, India (WRI, India) on June 7 to work on scaling up safe, accessible, green, playful and inclusive neighbourhoods for young children and families across the city.
An update on Monday stated that in January 2022, Kohima was announced as one of the 10 winners of the Nurturing Neighbourhoods Challenge (NNC) hosted by the Smart Cities Mission of the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs in collaboration with the Bernard van Leer Foundation (BvLF) and with WRI India as the technical partner.
“The challenge aims to support city agencies and their partners to adopt an early childhood development focus in the design, planning, and management of cities. By mainstreaming this lens in projects and long-term plans, cities will target improvements to public spaces, mobility, neighbourhood planning, access to services, and data management to enhance the health and wellbeing of young children and their caregivers,” it read.
Kohima, along with other selected cities, is now proceeding into the second phase of the challenge, which involves scaling up interventions over the next two years, it said.
KSCDL undertook five pilot projects in the first phase of the challenge. This included development of a pocket park, toddler-friendly play spaces, and caregiver amenities alongside public facilities in Highland Park, Forest Colony and New Reserve Colony. Kohima’s scale-up plan will be based on eight strategies namely; replication of pilots, capacity building, institutional set-up, partnerships and diverse leaders, plans and policy changes, data based planning, m & e, civic engagement, and financial sustainability. Further, under the supervision of CEO, KSCDL and Administrator, KMC, a nurturing neighborhood cell will be formed, which will be responsible for planning, implementing and monitoring child-and family-friendly projects in the city.
The MoU was signed by Kezhazelhou Theunuo(Chief Executive Officer, KSCDL), T Lanusenla Longkumer (Administrator, KMC) in the presence of Kezhochole Rhetso,(GM Planning, KSCDL), and members of the WRI India team.
WRI India, with the support of BvLF, will provide the city of Kohima with technical assistance and capacity building towards implementing the Nurturing Neighbourhoods scale-up objectives.
Kezhazelhou Theunuo, CEO, KSCDL, said, “Kohima is proud to be one of the top 10 cities under NNC. Adapting to our hilly terrain, we plan to identify small pockets of land and create shared public spaces and pocket parks for people in neighbourhoods across Kohima. We further plan to replicate play spaces around facilities supporting healthy early childhood developmentand create safer streets for young children and families.”
Meanwhile, T Lanusenla Longkumer, Administrator, KMC, said, “Through the Nurturing Neighbourhoods Challenge we would like to create safe and engaging outdoor spaces for young children and their families near their homes, so they can spend more time outdoors. We will also work towards building resilience in the city through various neighbourhood-level interventions.”