wfn.org | Bhutanese refugees spur progress in Nepalese villages

[FRANK_IMHOFF.parti@ecunet.org (FRANK IMHOFF)]

With LWF's help, villagers reap from aid development work

GENEVA, 21 December 1998 (lwi) - Madhumalla, a very poor village with a
population of 17,750 and surrounded by four large Bhutanese refugee camps,
is gradually showing clear signs of progress. The force behind this shift 
is Kashinath Poudel, the lively and assertive chairman of Madhumalla
Village Development Committee, who has made it his ambition to develop
this impoverished community, with or without the refugees. He gave up a
promising career as a school headmaster to pursue a dream: "to make
Madhumalla the most developed VDC (subdistrict) in the southeast."

Since then, all four schools in the area have constructed additional
classroom blocks. One has even upgraded its status and consequently
receives full government's assistance after it added two blocks including
toilet facilities, and acquired furniture and teaching materials
sufficient to meet the criteria for registration as a secondary school.
Problems of water supply are being solved, as the fifth of seven
gravity-fed networks started operating in September and 30 new hand pumps
have also been installed around the village.

Surprisingly, all this investment was made possible precisely by the
presence of the refugees. For seven years now, about 94,000 refugees from
Bhutan have been living in camps in neighbouring Nepal. The seven camps in
Jhapa and Morang Districts have put a heavy burden on the surrounding
villages. However, the refugees' presence has had very different effects
on the Nepalese, going by the communities' response to this difficult
situation. Madhumalla is one of two examples highlighted by the Lutheran
World Federation (LWF) World Service (WS) report on how initiatives by the
population and vigorous local politicians can turn the work of aid
organisations into opportunities for village development.

In this case, the villagers take advantage of the LWF Refugee-affected
Area Rehabilitation Programme (RARP). The aim of this programme is to
reduce the shockingly large contrasts between the relatively well-managed
refugee camps and the conditions in the surrounding villages. But
Madhumalla has not just depended on the RARP. It has mobilised its own
resources and other external sources such as the German Development
Society, the United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF), the German embassy
and the Rotary Club's "Village Core".

The RARP has provided only 75 percent of the funding for the school and
water supply improvements, leaving the remaining 25 percent for the
village. Although this is a substantially big chunk for the locals,
community participation becomes a decisive factor in the progress recorded
by the programme. Besides the construction schemes, the villagers have
also begun educational programmes, with 30 women studying legal issues and
32 taking courses in cookery, gardening, and street theatre for ecological
and hygienic awareness. Waste disposal bins have been installed in the
market area and 12 hand pumps provide drinking water.

Some of the development schemes, launched by the villagers entirely from
their own resources, focus on far reaching effects. In the last five
years, for instance, 600,000 trees have been planted along the Mawa River
to combat erosion, improve environmental conditions and provide a source
of fuel for the future. The trees will also generate future income to help
maintain Madhumalla's progress in the long-term. It has even been possible
to resettle landless families on low land reclaimed from the river - 150
families in the last 12 months. On the local political scene, rivalries
and disputes among various parties and their supporters have mostly been
buried.

Elsewhere, refugees are the envy of the local people

Four kilometres from Madhumalla lies Dumshe. During the monsoon season,
this village is cut off by the rising waters of the Mawa River. For the
small community of 1,750, living near the Beldangi refugee camps, home to
30,440 Bhutanese, has mostly been damaging. The majority, 75 families, are
landless while the other 60 live off small plots of land. In lean times,
all of them have to sell their labour for 15 rupees ($0.22) per day,
because abundant work force is available from the camps. For the village
families, this is the only means of earning a living. The refugees, on the
other hand, receive a subsistence ration and are not supposed to work, but
they somehow manage to earn additional income unofficially. In addition,
the refugee camps receive aid from international organisations. Thus in
the midst of  this impoverished and underdeveloped area, there is a gap
between the poor Nepalis and the Bhutanese, who are also poor but are
provided with comparatively better support by the donor organisations.

Environmental conditions in Dumshe have also deteriorated. The water table
has fallen. The refugees gather firewood in the forest, so that the women
have to go further and further to collect fuel. Complaints about crime and
thefts are on the increase. The refugees have other advantages, for
example in medical care, which arouse envy.

However, the RARP has brought about some useful improvements.in Dumshe. A
new classroom, latrines and furnishings were added to the primary school.
Ten hand pumps, each shared by five neighbours, provide drinking water.
But the villagers show little initiative of their own and do not make full
use of the improvements they have. The greatest need for this village, and
especially the most disadvantaged groups, is to become mobilised and
organised, according to an LWF report from Nepal. "Only by gaining
awareness and building confidence is this community likely to make
progress," the report says. For the LWF, the two village scenarios present
a challenge: how can the RARP provide meaningful and sustainable
development opportunities for both? The goal is, as Madhumalla
demonstrates, to turn the threat of the refugees' presence into a
development opportunity.

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Lutheran World Information
Assistant Editor, English: Pauline Mumia
E-mail: pmu@lutheranworld.org
http://www.lutheranworld.org/