The Sustainable Livelihood Institute is a unique initiative by the Government of Tamil Nadu- It is the only Institute of its kind in all of South Asia offering Sustainable Livelihood Capacity Building solutions. The Institute conceptualizes, designs, organizes and delivers programmes for skill, knowledge and perspective building on sustainable livelihoods to the officials of the Rural Development Department as well as leaders of the Rural Communities. It has been developed to deliver successful, equitable and environment friendly livelihood solutions for the state of Tamil nadu.

The institute has been evolved jointly by Tamil Nadu Rural Livelihood Mission (TNSRLM) and the IRD Unit of Auroville as an autonomous entity and is governed jointly by both of them. After the release of the Government Order by the Government of Tamilnadu constituting the Institute in December 2014 (download the G.O.), the Institute started the preliminary work and since May 2015 it started to offer capacity building programmes.

Goal
To establish an international quality/standard sustainable livelihood institute in Tamil nadu that will work on cutting edge sustainable livelihood solutions in terms of capacity building programmes, research and outreach solutions especially for the poor and the vulnerable sections of the population by utilizing the competencies built by Auroville based institutions and its associates.

Support
The initial seed funding support will be provided by the Tamil nadu Government through the State Rural Livelihood Mission. The Institute aims to work closely with the State and Central Government schemes on sustainable livelihood and customize capacity building and outreach programmes for them, thereby ensuring a win-win relationship with the departments.

So far…
In the first year of operation, the Institute has provided several capacity building programmes in the focused areas relevant to the rural livelihood. Between (May 2015 and -March 2016), the Institute provided 62 training programmes in which over 1000 participants from across the state of Tamil nadu and Odisha participated. The first year report can be read here .