As a step towards sensitizing and strengthening the capacities of the local authorities which work closely with the local communities, WERC  initiated this project in the Nuwara Eliya district with the support of Women Defining Peace (WDP) in February 2009. This project aimed to improve on attitudes and skills of Grama Niladharis (village officers) and Social Welfare Officers (SWOs) to enhance their capacity towards being more sensitive and responsive in addressing issues of violence against women in their respective areas.

As requested by the Grama Niladharis and Divisional Secretaries, a 3-day workshops carried out considering three groups consisted of Social Welfare Officers, Women Development Officers and National Childcare and Protection Authority at DS Level who did not get a chance to participate such programmes earlier.

Three posters on the themes on Reproductive Health Rights, Violence against Girl Child and Women's Participation in Politics were launched at the dissemination workshop and later introduced and, distributed during the community interactions.

Additionally, as part of the project, finalizing the publications on the Handbook on Prevention of Violence against Women and the Training Module on Gender Sensitization were also done. The Handbook was formulated in to English, Tamil and Sinhala. This was complied by Prof. Maithree Wickramasinghe, Ms. Sanjeewani Rupasinghe and Ms. Kumari Witharana.