Seven Sisters Development Assistance - SeSTA

Seven Sisters Development Assistance (SeSTA) empowers communities in remote rural areas of Northeast (NE) India by initiating rural development initiatives together with the villagers. Registered in the year 2011, under Societies Registration Act (SRA), 1860, SeSTA was conceived to put systematic effort towards the socioeconomic development of NE by building capabilities of poor communities, promoting and strengthening their institutions to facilitate them out of poverty.

SeSTA works with 2,50,000 women farmers and their families in 2,500 villages spread across 57 development blocks of 30 districts in four States (Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Meghalaya and Tripura). It supports women from poor and marginalized households on skilling them on scientific agricultural interventions in food crop and vegetable crops, orchards, Natural Resources Management (NRM) and supporting the intensification and diversification of other livelihoods prospects such as goat rearing, piggery, fisheries, mushroom cultivation.

SeSTA envisions about 6-8 years of work within a community in a particular block for community to reach a level of self-sustenance and activities to become sustainable. In this period, sufficient training, capacity building and hand holding of the community and community institutions are provided so that beyond that period, community institutions can function on their own. Community Institutions in this context are Self-Help Groups (SHG), Producer Groups (PG), Village Organization (VO) and Farmers Producer Organizations (FPO).

SeSTA maps different government and private/non-government institutions within its working areas. Later, SeSTA allies with the identified organizations to mobilize financial resources along with other relevant resources for the SHG and PG members.

Website: https://sesta.org/

Number of Employees: 151-200

Primary Service Delivery: Embedded support, 1:1 coaching, Cohort-based, Self-service templates/guides, Online learning modules

Sub-services Offering: Strategic Planning, Program Strategy, Fundraising Strategy & Donor Engagement, Proposal & Pitch Development, MEL Systems & Tools, Strategic MEL Design & Use, HR Systems & Tools, HR Policy & Compliance Support, Compliance & Regulatory Support, Financial Systems & Tools, Governance Strengthening, Leadership Development & Coaching, Organizational Role Clarity & Structure, Digital Capacity Building, Communications Strategy & Planning, Digital & Social Media Tools

Mode of Engagement: In-person