Imphal, 10 Dec (KNN) The North East Cane and Bamboo Development Council (NECBDC) cluster at Noney, Manipur had conducted a ‘Design & Product Development Programme” training on Cane and Bamboo based utility products for 10 days.

The program was aimed to empower local rural men and women - youth, farmers and artisans to get an inside knowledge on the various aspects of designing and product development in order to give a value addition to the existing way of working out on a product, said the press release.

The programme was conducted under the aegis of National Bamboo Mission (NBM) which focuses the North Eastern Region. In order to technically support them, NBM has designated CBTC as one of the Bamboo Technical Support Groups (BTSG) for the eight states of North East India and the eastern states of West Bengal, Jharkhand and Orissa.

It maintains a training calendar to ensure dissemination of new developments in the cane and bamboo sector.

Trainers involved in the training of craftsperson are routinely updated on new processes, methods, technologies and products by CBTC. This function accommodates the dynamic demands, which originate at various levels ranging from trainer’s self-evaluation, policy makers feedback, global trends and CBTC’s assessment of the field situations.

Preceding the commencement of every trainer’s training programme, the size and content of the input volume intended for the training is arrived at after much research and brainstorming.

As per the economic survey of Manipur (2019-2020),  the important major forests products are timber, firewoods, bamboos, cane etc. which also a cultural and lifestyle significance for the local community.