The key phrases in the Mission Statement are : 
7.1. "TO FOSTER A PROCESS OF ONGOING CHANGE IN FAVOUR OF THE RURAL POOR". 
This statement focuses on how, in general terms, MYRADA pursues its Vision, namely by "fostering process".  
To "foster" means to provide regular, systematic personalised care. We foster process through our regular meetings with small groups, (we have on an average 200 meetings daily), by house visits and meetings with men and women at their work places or where they meet socially and with children in and out of school. MYRADA’s approach is not expressed through ad-hoc and occasional melas, demonstrations or large gatherings - these are usually addressed by important speakers with little attention to personal interaction and processes. Such gathering seldom foster change and they often serve to "polarise" groups. Our meetings, on the contrary are regular (weekly), on days and times fixed by the groups, not by us, and with agendas set by the people. We do not indulge in - and discourage others from - calling meetings at times and in places convenient to us or to visitors. This why we are firm in discouraging village visits by Government and Bank staff at times convenient to them, but take visitors to regular meetings no matter how far away the scheduled meetings are on that particular day. To organise meetings to suit our agendas and timings is to "impose" not to"foster". People’s institutions required to support change cannot be imposed, they have to be fostered - nurtured steadily and systematically; there is no short cut in development.

7.2. A Process requires that the source of the momentum for change shifts from an external agent to self motivation. In other words, we may initiate change, but the people must be provided with skills, opportunities and motivation to carry it along. Process also requires that people have a stake and take a certain level of risk so that the basis for sustained involvement exists; this is why we motivate people to save and to invest their savings in the common fund of the groups and to be fully involved in contributing, planning, managing and maintaining every activity from Watershed Management to Housing and Drinking Water Systems.  
The process we seek to initiate is not a "Movement", though it has certain features of one. By a movement I mean a sudden surge in response to popular issues without adequate attention to institutionalisation. Movements are good but not necessarily the right strategy at all times. MYRADA’s Mission however has features common to a movement. For one, both require people with values that motivate commitment to a vision; both have the capacity to spread on their own momentum.
7.3. "On-going Change" : Development for us is a sustainable process of ongoing change. This requires that we try to ensure that the very first action taken triggers off a process that becomes on-going and sustainable. This is where our PRA exercises in participatory planning play a significant role, since, more than the output (a plan) it is the beginning of a process in which the plan is reviewed, and if necessary revised by the people and all others involved. PRA spread so fast in MYRADA because it fitted in well with our Mission. PRA introduces participation in an organised and systematic manner at every stage of the process; the output of PRA is tangible; it provides documentation of the process while at the same time sustains the momentum; this also increases the level of accountability. The people therefore should not only be integral participants in preparing the final plan with the Government, they should also be free to discuss and revise it, if required, on their own. Today it is used by the people for participatory management, monitoring and evaluation - to decide which family has attained an adequate degree of self-reliance and no longer requires all the support provided.

 If the change we seek to foster is not a one time affair but an on-going process, which is a significant feature of all sustainable development, then we need to equip people to cope with on-going change. This requires that people acquire certain skills to manage change and that they have the ability to establish and maintain stable institutions which they access and control of, so that in turn these institutions provide them with a degree of confidence to expose themselves to face new challenges and are also able to support them in this effort and in their new responses.

Change cannot be sustained by individuals alone who are poor and vulnerable but by people’s groups, at least in the first few years. Hence an important component of our Mission is the fostering of socially functional groups which are the basic institutions in the first phase of the development process. Once people have developed a certain degree of confidence they are able to conform to the rules and regulations of public institutions and are able to relate with them to sustain progress. This is also why we need to establish relationships (which are not exploitative but as equal as possible) between our groups and Banks, Cooperatives and Government Departments providing services since these will remain in the area when we withdraw. A constant flow of information is also required to motivate and sustain change. This requires that our people attain a level of literacy and numeracy and that they are exposed to the experiences of others and to information sources. This is also why we are encouraging regular literacy and numeracy classes and exposures for our people; it broadens the area of operation within which they feel confident. But an on-going process and the institutions that support it, must not only be sustainable they must also foster equity - the weaker groups must also have a stake in them. This is a strong thrust of MYRADA’s Mission - to focus on the rural poor and to ensure that in all participatory activity they have an effective role to play. Our Credit Management Groups which focus only on the poor, provides the clearest expression of MYRADA’s Mission. These groups are not only appropriate to manage credit, but they are also autonomous, innovative and differ from each other, besides focusing entirely on the poor.

"SUPPORTING THE RURAL POOR IN THEIR EFFORTS TO DEVELOP SUSTAINABLE LIVELIHOODS FOUNDED IN APPROPRIATE AND INNOVATIVE LOCAL LEVEL INSTITUTIONS".  

8.1. MYRADA considers that the need to sustain change is important enough for its Mission Statement to be more explicit in this matter. It explains that this ‘on-going change’ will be fostered by supporting the emergence and growth of appropriate and ‘innovative’ local level institutions which will in turn support sustainable livelihoods. Such institutions are required to support a process of ‘on-going’ change by providing all that is necessary to motivate and manage change in a constructive way. But care should be taken that institutionalisation does not kill or retard the process of change. This can happen if representatives of groups are not changed regularly and begin to consolidate their interests. This can also happen if staff become complacent and cease to provide adequate information and training to groups to motivate and manage change; it can also happen if the reasons for change, or lack of it, are not regularly analysed by all the staff and people and lessons learnt and incorporated in the group and organisation. 

8.2. This strategy also marks a radical change from the accepted pattern of providing development inputs through a delivery system which deals directly with individuals and which operates according to its own agenda rules, procedures, criteria of viability and time schedules which seldom meet the needs of people. The people in fact have no control of these delivery systems and very limited access, if any, to them. Hence the need for alternate, institutions of the people over which they have control; these are usually innovative and not standardised but tailored by each group to meet its own needs. We have found that such institutions are not entirely new; they are often based on traditional linkages which form the basis of group formation and on cultural values, which have become dormant and need to be revived in a new social setting. I have described this aspect in detail in the Blue Book. These institutions operate on their own rules, have their own culture and sanctions and must be accepted by the official institutions as legitimate. Though the Blue Book focuses on alternate and innovative institutions which focus on managing credit, a similar approach has been applied with varying degrees of success to all our other major programmes like forestry, watersheds, drinking   water, housing and health. What we must understand and explain to them is that MYRADA’s Mission does not focus on the growing of trees or building of houses or water tanks. 

8.3. MYRADA’s Mission focuses on ‘appropriate’ management systems created by people, which are required to plan, manage and sustain forestry, housing, watersheds, drinking water systems etc. Hence, though MYRADA does have engineers and foresters who provide technical expertise, our contributions is not in the technical areas; we provide these services only because they are not available locally. As one of our Board Members remarked : "We cannot teach the foresters about trees and nurseries". Our mission and contribution is to shift the management of forestry, watersheds and other resources from a pattern that is dominated (either by the Government or the powerful classes) centralised and standardised, to one in which all groups of people have a stake and which is largely organised and managed by the people and accountable to them. But by just saying so, or by calling people and telling them that they must manage watersheds or forests will be to create more confusion and result in disaster. What we are doing is to sit and listen to all parties concerned in a watershed or forests or village and to work out with various groups among the people (and the Government officers) a plan that they see is appropriate, viable and manageable, and to support all parties concerned to develop institutions and skills not only to implement this plan but to change or revise it, and to make the entire effort sustainable even if it is not technically perfect. What is technically perfect is not necessarily manageable by the local people. What is manageable however may not necessarily be equitable, unless, an external agent like MYRADA takes particular care to ensure not only that the poor receive benefits but that they become part of the process of on-going change; they will need extra support to achieve this, which MYRADA provides.

8.4. It is not enough - and could prove disastrous to people - to foster only a process of change, what is also required as an integral part of the Mission is to support and build up the skills to manage change. This is where institutions (in this case peoples institutions which have a participatory character and are not dominated by an person and clique) have a critical role to play. From experience we have seen that these institutions if standardised and centralised loose their autonomy and voluntarism and will soon collapse. They have emerged in an autonomous way and must be supported to continue and strengthen this characteristic - in fact these are the peoples quality circles. The present Cooperative Societies which are large and comprise different groups are not quality circles; they resemble rather a company which consists of employees from different and competing industries and with conflicting interests.

8.5. It is because of this thrust in our Mission that MYRADA runs head long into Government Departments and policies. Let us take a Watershed for example. Many Government Departments exercise proprietary rights over lands in the watersheds : The Forest Department own the upper reaches, the Revenue Department controls other common areas, the PWD the tanks etc. The people have legal control only over their own private plot. The rights over so-called common lands are not clear; hence no one is willing to invest time or resources in managing them; in most areas they are used by the dominant classes. Yet because a watershed is one drainage system, all the plots of land and the resources have to be managed together. A technical plan to regenerate the resources of the watershed can only be implemented, first if all the departments give up a part of their proprietary rights and cease being exclusive with the reminder, secondly if their rights on all lands are clear and thirdly if the people are willing to raise their vision beyond their homesteads and fields to encompass the micro watershed which will help them to realise that all have a stake in the process. But to whom will these rights be transferred and who will manage the watershed? This is where MYRADA’s roles come in. Our Mission is to help people to build up their capacity to manage their watersheds through acquiring appropriate skills and to set up institutions to which these rights are transferred voluntarily. This involves not only systems which ensure that the rights of each family are protected but that the overall objective of achieving the common good is achieved, on the strength of which depends the progress of each family. Within this context the value of equity also finds a place. The landless in the watershed where the process has been initiated have been given loans from the credit groups and the rights to harvest fodder from protected areas. This is a small beginning. No doubt there is tension at times where certain rights are claimed, but not recognised by others or by law; once again a process of negotiation and pressure is initiated by MYRADA and gradually institutionalised by the people. An analogous situation obtains in degraded forest areas and in wastelands. But this paper will become too long to explain them all. I hope that the example given serves to bring out the focus of MYRADA’s Mission and is adequate as a basis for discussion and reflection. It is because of this focus on management systems that we have called the occasional papers which we bring out "Rural Management Systems Papers". They focus on our small but systematic  break-throughs in helping people to establish "Management Systems" which are appropriate to their situation