Until recently, residents of district 11 in Herat didn’t receive any urban services such as-clean streets, garbage collection, drainage clearing, and maintenance. “Polluted and dusty environment is harming the society. There are many insects and diseases during the summer season.” Shamayel Azizi said. During election of CDC members in District 11.

There are efforts by the municipality, government line ministries and departments to serve people and meet their demands for quality municipal services, but people consider they are not sufficient. The Government of Afghanistan designed the Clean and Green Cities (CGC) programme to meet people’s municipal service needs and create jobs. When the program was introduced to people, they were surprised because this was the first public programme that will create job opportunities and provide environmental services in Herat city in partnership with municipality.

The programme will be piloted in District 11 through the People’s Process approach. It puts citizens at the center of development decision making, empowers community, and provides labor grants to communities through community-led implementation of sub projects and mobilizing community contributions. The programme will promote and prioritize that vulnerable households, urban poor, IDPs, returnees, and women are the main beneficiaries of the livelihood opportunities and directly employed for programme implementation.

Today, the situation in District 11 of Herat is looking brighter. CGC programme will invest in labor intensive urban clean-up, services, greening and beautification activities.