Trainings, reports and workshops development

In a recent article it has been pointed out the paradox of local level governance in Nepal is that much money and effort have been poured into it over the decades but with no visible improvement.
In 1996 UNDP and DANIDA pushed on the government to introduce the Local Self-Governance Act 1999 which failed to include the vital provisions regarding the user groups which showed good performances in managing the forestry community development which has been fully domestically managed by local community.
With no provisions regarding the formation of local groups, the enormous fund to decentralization has been managed by, as the article points, local bodies were invariably composed of the hand-picked favourites of the village elites.
As a result, the billions of rupees that went through the DDCs (District Dev. Office) and VDCs (Village Dev. Office) in various tied and untied grants over the years made little dent on the problems of poverty and deprivation that continue to remain rampant in Nepal’s villages. The same seems happened for other local authorities as DHO (health) and DEO (education).
The misuse of huge funds and the needs of a serious reforms of local body, most of them not working or bad working due to that lack of elected officials and good mnagement should suggest to international donors to go directly to the primary stakeholders: it means community through local user groups (for specific projects), community schools, etc.
This work should be a priority for INGOs and NGOs which must operate gross route level as their guiding principles should require. Unfortunately this is not happening for some of them. It is the case of Centro Cooperazione Sviluppo INGO (CCS Italia) which during the last two years left good community tied projects in Kavre moving towards funding the local DEO (district education office) and DHO (district health office). This negative attitude seems directed to void the role and capacity of the local NGO working in Kavre since many years. The reasons could be the strong critics  the local NGO moved regarding the ineffective use of Italian fund and donation made by the officers of the INGO and their incapacity to operate directly with the community. Maybe also their laziness and high salaries.
The same misadventure which is running, in a great scale, DANIDA. They decided to support a 10 million rupies project (19 months) project entitled “Promoting Local Governance for Effective Service Delivery” in six selected districts.
It was said to be “supply-side” governance strengthening initiative and comprised workshops for government officials, local politicians, NGO/CBO officials, and “service receivers”. The project developed training manuals, formed coordination committees and “good governance pressure groups”, and held public hearings with government officials including the CDOs in attendance.
It seems the same trend followed by Centro Cooperazione Sviluppo (CCS Italy) in which instead to work in the community, it is easier to work through local bureaucrats. It is the training and workshop development which is the main activity wide spreading among INGOs and institutional donors.
This kind of “projects” doesn’t need many activities, fieldwork, and accountability of service given.
The single most important contribution that the government and donors could make to promote good governance and development in the villages is to empower the stakeholders and assuring effective service delivery and the only way is to go in the villages working with people. 

Guna Dhakal- Social Worker-Kathmandu

NGO needs credibility and efficiency

Some past posts criticized the work and the role of some INGO operating in Nepal. we receive this article on the matter from Syed Mohammad Ali, Pakistani Researcher

Engaging in a debate about the role of NGOs should not be confined to questioning their credibility, but also their ability to deliver services efficiently and in a sustained manner
A landmark Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness was put forth in 2005 which acknowledged that international development aid needs to respect the priorities of recipient countries and that donor organisations must begin to coordinate their activities with one another. In development terms, this understanding implied the need for donor alignment to improve the harmonisation of aid.
Three years have passed since this declaration was signed, yet the overall ineffectiveness of development assistance continues to evoke much criticism. International non-governmental organisations perhaps remain the harshest critics of aid effectiveness. But what about the effectiveness of these NGOs in utilising aid for development purposes themselves?
After all, international NGOs receive large shares of aid from donors, which adds to the funding generated by them privately and amounts to a significant sum. In some donor countries, the share of NGOs in the expenditure of official development aid is as high as 20 percent. The aid granted by NGOs from OECD nations alone amounted to a total of to almost $15 billion in 2005. A similar amount was given to them in 2006.
Some of the larger NGOs now have budgets bigger than longstanding government donors. The overall budget of ‘World Vision International’, for example, exceeds the aid budget of Italy. The ‘Save the Children Alliance’ spends more money on development than Finland.
Given the enormity of funds involved, a closer look is needed over how NGOs are spending this money meant to assist developing countries. Some recent research in this regard indicates that there is due basis for concern.
Generally, international NGOs are considered to be able to target aid more effectively than state-run development agencies. This confidence is based on the assumption that such entities are more aware of the needs of poor people – since most of them directly cooperate with local level civil society groups, enabling them to circumvent corrupt governments. It is also claimed that international NGOs are less influenced by donor governments’ commercial and political interests, and more responsive to on-ground needs.
However a look at cumulative NGO activities indicates that like official donors, international NGOs are also very subjective in where they chose to spend their money. Ethiopia, for example, has been found to host 5 separate affiliates of World Vision, 7 Oxfam agencies, 6 Care International and 12 Save the Children offices.
Similarly, in other relatively small countries such as Guatemala, Sri Lanka and Zimbabwe, more than 40 of the 60 largest NGOs have a presence. This is in stark contrast with other deserving countries like Congo, Yemen and the Central African Republic, where only a handful of these international NGOs operate. Therefore, like official donors, NGOs also ignore the income position of recipient countries and their genuine requirement for aid.
Partially at least, the evident concentration of NGO presence in selected countries is explained by their dependence on government donor priorities, which earmarks official assistance for specific countries. But then if NGOs from donor countries have a tendency to replicate the aid allocation of official donors, surely it must also limit their independence in terms of decision-making.
There are also other indications illustrating that international NGOs lack serious resolve in making their programmes more responsive to needs felt on the ground. For instance, there is little evidence that NGOs are better at respecting the priorities of their local counterparts than of official donors.
In the directorial boards of 55 of the world’s largest development NGOs, only 6 per cent of members have been found to belong to developing countries. This power differential is compounded by the fact that local NGOs themselves lack direct access to international aid, since most official donors restrict their funding for NGOs to organisations based within their own countries, instead of routing this aid directly to NGOs in developing countries.
It is interesting to note that the Global Accountability Report for 2006 found that the World Bank and even the corporate sector have better procedures for managing complaints than international NGOs.
It is about time that international NGOs take a critical look at their own activities instead of using most of their energy to convince donor nations to abide by the principles of aid effectiveness. Engaging in a debate about the role of NGOs should not be confined to questioning their credibility, but also their ability to deliver services efficiently and in a sustained manner.
This ambiguity concerning the effectiveness of NGOs working at the international level has also percolated down to the national level. There is a growing undercurrent of scepticism in the general public about the role of all types of NGOs. In the case of Pakistan for instance, the entire sector is often seen as attempting to propagate and impose the values of a foreign donor agency on an unsuspecting local populace.
While development practitioners must acknowledge that some problems do exist within this sector, and that the efficacy or design of many initiatives can be questioned, the entire sector however cannot be written off as being corrupt, bureaucratic or inefficient.
Moreover, not all local NGOs are recipients of international aid. According to research done by the Pakistan Centre for Philanthropy some years ago for instance, Pakistanis themselves were found to have given five times more funds to non-profit organisations than what these organisations had received in grants. Nonetheless, the need to bridge the credibility gap concerning internal governance, financial accountability and the participatory approach of NGOs is vital if they want to remain legitimate stakeholders in the process of international development.
A voluntary NGO certification programme has been initiated in several developing countries, including our own, which is a good thing. Scrutiny of international NGOs at a broader level through aid effectiveness forums is also a welcome move.
Ultimately, NGOs must be able to fulfil the needs of the local communities more responsively and expediently than larger international development agencies, or else there is be no real justification for their profusion.

Mid Day Meals programmes in ECDs

We received

 Dear Friends

It is really upsetting to read In previuos posts that due to the high running costs of the italian INGO financing education and nutrition programmes in Kavre District, they decided to reduce daily meal integrations for children in Bal Bikas Kendra (ECDs).

It is proved by several studies and experiences that Mid Day Meals programmes is exert a positive influence on enrolment and attendance in schools. In India several states manage such activities since 1980s, becoming national as the decision of Indian Government in 2004.

You should advice this people of italian INGO to read the National Programme of Nutritional Support to Primary Education, 2006 which could give them some teachings how to run educational and nutrition programmes in a effective way for children and people . Below the link, Friendly wishes,

Nagendra Amatya-Kathmandu

 

 http://education.nic.in/mdm/FINAL_Guidelines_MDM_19_sept.pdf) 

Activities Progress Report 2007-2008

It is available the Report of CCS Nepal NGO 2007-2008: (PDF file)

 

 

 

 

activities progress_report_2007-2008

activities report 2006

activities-summary-report-2005

activities-summary-report-2004

Give opportunities: infrastructures

The main area where we are working is Timal (KAvre District) where there is no electricity. It means people has not opportunities to develop, to create cottage industries, to have a future. Many people is forced to migrate because in the hills there is not chances for a better life, to have children well educated, to receive health assistance, to find job opportunities.We believe  to improve education, health and  to create opportunities might be a way to avoid social and cultural disintegration.

During 2005 we has several meetings with people of Timal and all together we decide to utilize the chance given by NEA (Nepal Energy Authority) Rural Electrification program to create a local grid in seven VDCs. (Basic Grid Plan is avaible in research page above)

Cooperation & Development Nepal with engineers did a detailed survey of the area and we published a technical project which was presented to the community; lawyers prepared plan by-the- laws and rules to manage the cooperative (called TCRECA)

In this way the Shakty Project started and in 2008 the local grid is under construction.

We mobilized community and we formed a local users cooperative which board members were elected by local groups and trained by Tribhuvan University lawyers.

Local users groups were informed and they were able to collect around Nrs. 3000 each householder (56.000) to deposit the 20% of the cost of the grid building as NEA required.

From middle of 2007 the cooperative is self-managed with support of Karuna INGO and Centro Cooperazione Sviluppo (ONLUS).

But we are proud to be able to mobilize community  throughout trusteeship and transparency to initiate this work and we hope it will be well managed.

In January 2007 a big fire destroyed several houses in Thulo Parel VDCs we provided to all families new roofs (picture down)

Community Development: buffalo project

  Development means to enhance the building capacity and human capital of the community in which projects are implemented. It means to involve people in all stages of the project to discuss needs and problems, to find together the means to face them, to analyse the outputs of activities, to modify them in sharing experiences, to assure future sustainibility to the achievements.

This we are doing in our projects on education and health where the community, SMCs and people have been fully involved, by financial point of view too.

The Buffalo Project has been implemented to help the poorest families in the villages. Cooperation & Development Nepal give the amount to buy a buffalo to the SMCs, they choose the family and provide the animal. The beneficiary receive a micro-finance help which has to be reimbursed to the SMC (School Management Commitee) within 16 months, so the cycle go on. Still now more than 21 families has a buffalo.

SMC members received trainings in micro-finance. We decided the project after a community survey in 210 householders (2004) in which emerged:

• 64% of householders had loan from non formal credit institution (money lenders)
• 15% from banks or relatives
• average of loan Nrs. 30.000-
• needs of loan: 39% food integration; 36% children education; 15% seeds and agricultural tools, 12% house building; 12% marriage expenditures; 18% business (People indicate more than an option)
• 26% householders without buffalo-

Micro-finance provided people a capital (buffalo), a source of income (buffalo products) and proteins for children.

This project has been indicated as a sample to European Union by UCODEP in 2006.

 

Health

In January 2006 we signed a cooperation agreement with Dhulikel Hospital, one of the best managed and community oriented health structure in Nepal. This cooperation is directed to integrate children support activities we are doing in the area.

In Timal some Health Posts should operate and Dhulikel Hospital is managing a Health Center in Bolde Pediche. No activities have been never made to assure basic and structured health controls to children.

With the Hospital we create medical teams and we visited more than 6000 children and around 2000 people. We set laboratory in the villages and we distributed de-worming and vitamins.

We collected many informations (see research page above) and we study actions for water sanitation in some schools where worms are more diffused.

Paediatric camps have been scheduled twice at year to monitor the area and to treat patients. Seven Health Workers (selected in the villages) constatly work with the schools. 

During teacher and facilitator trainings we have introduced health and sanitation and, during 2006, we distributed materials and documentations to all schools and ECDs .

The programs are still operating but in a lesser scale; during 2007 dental visits were introduced.

Our idea is to create a sort of insurance system based on community health fund managed by the SMCs which could be utilize for children hospitalization in Dhulikel Hospital. This fund has been implemented in 4 schools.

Secondary education and 10+2

 Progressively, in 2005 and 2006 we extended our support to secondary schools. We answered to a request coming from people which desired to give better education to their children. Furthermore foreign sponsors give help to children form ECDs to primary and they requested to go on with educational support to them. At the end of 2006 we had 11 teachers sponsored by us (with community contribution) in lower and secondary schools.

We provided text books and other school materials to 321 students to avoid drop out for expenditures which could not be sustained by family.

We organized coaching classes twice at year for more than 127 students to help them in overpass examinations.

During our community meetings, most of the people and teachers requested help to establish the first high secondary school (10+2) in the area to permit local and poorest students to follow studies. Before only few family can afford to support courses in Kathmandu for their children. The new school was inaugurated in december 2006.

We agreed with local stakeholders to assure a quota from underprivileged students and girls throughout sponsorship.

People collected several hundred thousand of rupies to register the school in Ministry of Education and to contribute to the new building. Members of the local committee ask former residents in the villages, now living in Kathmandu or abroad, to contribute to the project.

The day of inauguration a long banner with thousand names of contributors showed the committment of the people. Some of them gave only few rupies other thousands. The implementation of this project (10+2) showed how is possible mobilize people for a common goal and how NGO could help to manage and support community needs. From the middle of 2007, these projects have been cancelled by Centro Cooperazione Sviluppo ONLUS due to the diminishing of funds, they declared to the stakeholders.

Quality in education and human capital

   During our work we have also discovered than buildings and materials, are not the answer to everything. What is most important for development is commitment at the community level. In most activities in our projects community are deeply involved partecipating in expenditures and works.

 It means to work with people and people need to see they have the power to change their lives.

In education we operate to improve the quality of education from ECDs to Secondary Schools.

 During the years more than 500 teachers have been trained twice at year in cooperation with Dhulikel Hospital (health) and Tribhuvan University, Faculty of Law (Rule of Law).

 But we believe this work is not enough if we will be not able to find out new ways and methods for trainings which must be directed to improve the relation between teachers and pupils in order to make teaching more effective.

During the conflict we were able to improve the capacity of SMCs members organizing educational law trainings for around 350 people.

Periodical Community meetings and auditings are another way to involve people and to contribute in enforcing human capital. At the end of 2006 we published and distributed to all community our magazine Namuna (Example) in nepali.

 

Didactic materials to 6000 children

When we started our work in Timal we want give practical aid to community and children. We decided to distribute twice at year to all children in ECDs and primary schools didactic materials as copy-books, pen and pencils, school-bags, etc.
We believed to support in this way the family to educate children and to sent them to school.
Twice at year we had the opportunities to organize a  joyful happening in all community, where people gather and discuss the achievements of the projects.
During the distribution of April (baishak), we held community auditing where the SMC members of each school explained how the use our grants.

                            UNICEF and ICRC contributed in 2005 giving us tin boxes (vocabulary, dictionaries, teachers books, etc.) and first aid kits.

From the beginning of 2007 this activity has been suspended due to the lack of fund by Centro Cooperazione Sviluppo ONLUS, which through children sponsorship (that we are managing) supported this program.