Just a few words of explanation about the innovation of forest user
groups and mothers' groups in Nepal.
As a trained anthropologist and a section officer in the government I
had the rare and distinct opportunity to do an ethnographic study in a
Jumla village, HaadSinja, now a part of Kanika Sundari VDC, back in
1969-70 as a member of a multi-disciplinary team for the then Royal
Nepal Academy under the leadership of Mr. Satya Mohan Joshi, now the
Satabdi Purush of the country. At that time I came across a
traditional irrigation system, the Jachauri Kulo, dating back to
centuries, at least six hundred years old according to late Dr. Harka
Gurung. It was an extraordinary example of the efficacy of user
management of rural infrastructures. Since I was a civil servant in
the government, what I wrote became the policy of the government,
nearly literally. So, based on the Jachauri Kulo, I , as an
undersecretary in 1976, conceived the institution of user groups and
introduced them in a World Bank rural development project, and later,
as joint secretary, was able to enshrine the institution in the
Decentralization Act of 1982. Later in 1986/87, as an official in the
National Planning Commission, I was able to create conditions for the
innovation and introduction of forest user groups by the Forest
Ministry that happened in 1988. That was the turning point for Nepal's
totally dilapidated forests. The FUGs that now number 18,000 in the
country, went on to restore Nepal's forest wealth that had come under
the rampage of the people following its nationalization in 1957. In
1988 too, I as the additional secretary responsible for primary health
care in the Health Ministry, had the opportunity to innovate and
introduce Mothers' Groups and their Female Community Health
Volunteers, each of which now number 52,000 in the country and have
been the main institution that put Nepal on the health map of the
world by installing it as one of the top performers in achieving MDGs
in child survival and maternal mortality rate reduction. The one
lesson I learned over the years is that change-making involves a great
persistence spanning several years in the process.
The reason I consider user group approach indispensable also for
earthquake relief, rebuilding and rehabilitation is that it is only at
that level at the grassroots we can assure good governance conditions
that are essential for making proper use of resources and respond
adequately to the deprivations of the victims, which, by their very
nature, happen to be location, community and individual specific.
Since these are inclusive groups, they provide necessary political
space even to the weakest woman and man in the communities and they
get to protect their stakes in them. Therefore, most of these
institutions are also very equitable in the distribution of
development benefits in the communities. Given the fact that our
society remains persistently feudal in its character, patronization
remains the rule of the game of politics, and that makes just about
every single politician in Nepal a necessarily corrupt man.
If you go through this week's issue of Himal Khabar Patrika, once
again, they are talking about so many Kharab (trillion) rupees for
earthquake rebuilding. The fact that Nepal has been the recipient of
foreign aid starting 1949, billions of dollars have passed through the
country and that there is very little to show for them in the country
has clearly escaped the editors of the magazine and the wise-guy
economists profusely quoted in it. Nepal has benefitted from and
remains internationally respected for two innovations only mentioned
above, and both of them have been domestic innovations, not foreign
aid. Therefore, as suggested by Greta jee, for once, the donor
community must feel humbled by their chronic history of failures and
lend themselves to the efficacy of the Nepali institutions. It is for
these reasons that we should be talking more about the institutional
arrangement that is capable to reach out to all the EQ victims living
far and near, and put them in command of their own destiny, including
post-quake rebuilding of their lives. In order to provide a properly
streamlined support to that end, I find it necessary that the
country's President should take over, and use our 100,000 strong army
(and the private sector) to bring necessary technical and material
support to the victims' user groups in all the 30 plus
earthquake-affected districts in the country. Anything else would be
wastage of time and resources, huge misappropriation of international
aid--every known celebrity in the world seems to be raising funds for
Nepal--at the hands of these corrupt politicians and their similarly
qualified henchmen in the bureaucracy. All these would be the perfect
recipe for the perpetuation of the untold suffering of the Nepali
humanity that has always been poor and deprived and is now much worse
off due to the massive quake.
Bihari Krishna Shrestha
groups and mothers' groups in Nepal.
As a trained anthropologist and a section officer in the government I
had the rare and distinct opportunity to do an ethnographic study in a
Jumla village, HaadSinja, now a part of Kanika Sundari VDC, back in
1969-70 as a member of a multi-disciplinary team for the then Royal
Nepal Academy under the leadership of Mr. Satya Mohan Joshi, now the
Satabdi Purush of the country. At that time I came across a
traditional irrigation system, the Jachauri Kulo, dating back to
centuries, at least six hundred years old according to late Dr. Harka
Gurung. It was an extraordinary example of the efficacy of user
management of rural infrastructures. Since I was a civil servant in
the government, what I wrote became the policy of the government,
nearly literally. So, based on the Jachauri Kulo, I , as an
undersecretary in 1976, conceived the institution of user groups and
introduced them in a World Bank rural development project, and later,
as joint secretary, was able to enshrine the institution in the
Decentralization Act of 1982. Later in 1986/87, as an official in the
National Planning Commission, I was able to create conditions for the
innovation and introduction of forest user groups by the Forest
Ministry that happened in 1988. That was the turning point for Nepal's
totally dilapidated forests. The FUGs that now number 18,000 in the
country, went on to restore Nepal's forest wealth that had come under
the rampage of the people following its nationalization in 1957. In
1988 too, I as the additional secretary responsible for primary health
care in the Health Ministry, had the opportunity to innovate and
introduce Mothers' Groups and their Female Community Health
Volunteers, each of which now number 52,000 in the country and have
been the main institution that put Nepal on the health map of the
world by installing it as one of the top performers in achieving MDGs
in child survival and maternal mortality rate reduction. The one
lesson I learned over the years is that change-making involves a great
persistence spanning several years in the process.
The reason I consider user group approach indispensable also for
earthquake relief, rebuilding and rehabilitation is that it is only at
that level at the grassroots we can assure good governance conditions
that are essential for making proper use of resources and respond
adequately to the deprivations of the victims, which, by their very
nature, happen to be location, community and individual specific.
Since these are inclusive groups, they provide necessary political
space even to the weakest woman and man in the communities and they
get to protect their stakes in them. Therefore, most of these
institutions are also very equitable in the distribution of
development benefits in the communities. Given the fact that our
society remains persistently feudal in its character, patronization
remains the rule of the game of politics, and that makes just about
every single politician in Nepal a necessarily corrupt man.
If you go through this week's issue of Himal Khabar Patrika, once
again, they are talking about so many Kharab (trillion) rupees for
earthquake rebuilding. The fact that Nepal has been the recipient of
foreign aid starting 1949, billions of dollars have passed through the
country and that there is very little to show for them in the country
has clearly escaped the editors of the magazine and the wise-guy
economists profusely quoted in it. Nepal has benefitted from and
remains internationally respected for two innovations only mentioned
above, and both of them have been domestic innovations, not foreign
aid. Therefore, as suggested by Greta jee, for once, the donor
community must feel humbled by their chronic history of failures and
lend themselves to the efficacy of the Nepali institutions. It is for
these reasons that we should be talking more about the institutional
arrangement that is capable to reach out to all the EQ victims living
far and near, and put them in command of their own destiny, including
post-quake rebuilding of their lives. In order to provide a properly
streamlined support to that end, I find it necessary that the
country's President should take over, and use our 100,000 strong army
(and the private sector) to bring necessary technical and material
support to the victims' user groups in all the 30 plus
earthquake-affected districts in the country. Anything else would be
wastage of time and resources, huge misappropriation of international
aid--every known celebrity in the world seems to be raising funds for
Nepal--at the hands of these corrupt politicians and their similarly
qualified henchmen in the bureaucracy. All these would be the perfect
recipe for the perpetuation of the untold suffering of the Nepali
humanity that has always been poor and deprived and is now much worse
off due to the massive quake.
Bihari Krishna Shrestha
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