Encounter 

Dr. Henning Karcher is the Resident Representative of UNDP/Nepal and the Resident Coordinator of the UN Systems in Nepal. Since his arrival last year Dr. Karcher has concentrated his efforts in making UNDP programmes more effective in supporting HMG’s goals of poverty alleviation by focussing the programmes more into districts that are at the bottom of the human development index ranking. Furthermore, in order to enhance impact, he has been urging UN agencies and other donors to cooperate with each other so as to create more synergy and reduce duplication of development efforts. We talked with Dr. Karcher in Kathmandu some time ago. Below are excerpts of the conversation.

On UNDP’s presence in the Far West: Our overriding objective is the alleviation of poverty in line with the Ninth Plan of the Government. In that broader context, our focus in particular is on the poorest of the poor. It is our mandate to concentrate our efforts on those parts of the country where poverty is severest, and that is clearly in the Far West and the Mid West. The Human Development Report that we published brings out very forcefully the fact that the Far West has the lowest quality of life and the severest poverty.

One reason why we are focussing on Achham in particular is because it came out as the poorest district in the ICIMOD Atlas. This is also why when we considered expanding the districts covered by PDDP/LGP, we took deliberate decisions to include districts in the Far West. Thus Bajhang, Bajura and Darchula have been added under LGP implementation, and PDDP has been expanded to the terai districts of Kailali and Kanchanpur.

There are other programmes that have gone along with PDDP & LGP into the Far West. Some of the UNCDF funds will be allocated to districts in the Far West, and we have NORAD financing in Achham, Baitadi, Banke and Dang.

On expansion to other districts: We will now expand PDDP/LGP to another 20 districts. The reason we are expanding is mainly because there is a tremendous demand. There are some districts which consider themselves as second class citizens because they do not have data and a basic planning machinery and feel left out during discussions on planning. From the perspective of the government, this is a national programme, so there is reason to cover every district. Furthermore, we are all very encouraged by the fact that the Local Self-Governance Act has now made certain planning procedures official, like the provision that all DDCs should have their own information database and district development plans and do perspective planning. These have arisen from practices and experiences of PDDP & LGP.

We will be covering 60 districts in total. We would be covering the remaining too, but there are some districts where other donors like SNV are already applying the same methodology. So we will not be going there. In a way we are almost covering the entire country. This is a unique thing... and Nepal may be the only nation where a programme nearly covers the entire country.

About inter-agency cooperation: This is very important. In the framework of the Secretary General’s Reform Agenda all UN systems agencies are called upon to cooperate and to "act as one at the country level." He wants us to reinforce each other and generate synergy. We are doing this here at many different levels. For example we have the heads of agencies meetings every two weeks, and we undertake certain advocacy activities together.. like on International Women’s Day. We have undertaken a Common Country Assessment (CCA), and want to expand our operational cooperation at the grassroots. This is the reason why we have chosen two districts in the Far Western Region, Achham and Baitadi for enhanced cooperation.

As a first step we commissioned a study to obtain information on ongoing development cooperation activities and also determine the plans of various donor agencies. We have already developed a strategy that we have outlined under CCA. One area where

we are already making good progress within the UN system is the cooperation between UNICEF and UNDP. UNDP supports PDDP/LGP and UNICEF supports the Decentralized Planning for the Child Programme (DPCP). Recently the Representative of UNICEF and I visited a couple of districts to see how social mobilization helps UNICEF in their desire to improve child nutrition. The socially mobilized groups use their combined strengths to prepare sarbottam pitho for small infants and monitor the growth of the children. I can see a very encouraging synergy and complementarity among our two programmes.

We have another very promising joint initiative with WFP in the context of their Food for Work programme, in Bajhang, Baitadi and Achham districts. WFP is preoccupied with sustainability and has realized that just by providing food for the people to build a road does not automatically translate into a the project becoming sustainable, i.e. the roads being repaired regularly. On the other hand if roads are constructed in areas where the community has been socially mobilized, the groups jointly decide what they want to do. They contribute their labour, and when WFP moves on to another area the people stay organised and take care of the maintenance.

On cooperation with other donors: We also try to support more coordinated activities with other donors outside the UN system. Recently we went with representatives of DFID, NEDA and CCO to a couple of PDDP districts to show them examples of the enhancement of local self-governance at the district and community levels, and the positive impact of social mobilization on local development and poverty alleviation initiatives.

On coordination at the grassroots: I feel that coordination from the top is good, but ultimately coordination also has to take place at the grassroots...from the "bottom-up." So that is where we are focussing next. In September we organized a meeting in Nepalgunj where we invited all programme and project staff in the Far and Mid West regional and staff of district and regional offices of the agencies. We had a brainstorming workshop where we exchanged information on what all of us were doing and also shared ideas on areas where we could reinforce each other. We decided to establish a UN Coordination Committee for the Far and Mid West and also nominated UN Staff members as District Focal Points for necessary coordination and networking. We feel this is a very important initiative to create more synergy among our agencies and to help projects piggy-back on each other’s efforts and to avoid duplication of programmes.

On population growth: I feel strongly that whatever we do in terms of development in Nepal, will not go very far unless we can bring the population growth down. Population is to a large extent linked to awareness creation, education, etc. In our programmes, particularly PDDP, we have groups of people who represent a very ready audience. They meet every week. They are willing to listen to messages. So it makes a lot of sense to focus on these groups for injecting messages related to population, family planning, reproductive health and then offering follow-up services by making contraceptives available. I think this is a very natural thing to do in the context of our respective programmes rather than having everything related to population free-standing and separate.

On working with other donors in the Far West: I think there is a lot of goodwill, people certainly want to cooperate. I don’t want to present this in too ambitious terms. This is just an offer we are making. We are preparing district plans and will invite other donors to join hands with us. There is no need to be competitive in a district, because with more than 70 VDCs in a district like Achham there is space for everyone. And the needs are so great, it makes sense to cooperate. The UN system has already reacted very positively, and I think there will be positive reactions from other donors too. It requires persistence to get things done on the ground. It will take a while, with a lot of discussions to sort things out. Once it starts, I am positive that it will catch on.

Last thoughts: We think PDDP/LGP have the potential to really transform the face of Nepal to bring about poverty alleviation on a significant scale. Of course our own resources are not sufficient for that so we need to pursue a very systematic resource mobilization strategy trying to bring in more donors to work jointly. It makes a lot of sense to go together.
 

 
Namaste!

First of all we want to wish you a Happy New Year/Millennium 2000 ! May the new century hold for you and your personal and professional families all round prosperity ! As we leave the year, the decade, the century and the millennium behind, we hope that all of our efforts can become more effective and more meaningful to the people of Nepal, especially those living in the rural hills and plains.

This issue comes to you after a long time. As a result we have turned it into a 'Bumper' Bulletin, incorporating the matters of Bulletin # 8 & 9. The focus this time is in the PDDP districts in the Far West Region, following in line with the growing interest of HMG, UNDP and other donor agencies to synergise their efforts in the region. Although PDDP is now being implemented in five districts in the Far West (Kailali and Kanchanpur being the latest additions), we have just focused on the districts of the hills–– Achham, Baitadi and Dadeldhura. In our Spotlight section we have presented a profile of the three districts, along with PDDP's activities. We have featured viewpoints from the DDC officials and have presented writeups from our Regional/District Development Advisors about their personal experiences in the field. The Spotlight section also gives special focus on the plight of women in Achham due to the 'chhaupadi' system, which we have taken from the Red Cross' Report and the magazine Face to Face.

Our encounter with UNDP's Resident Representative Dr. Henning Karcher also focuses on UNDP's plans for integrated development in the far west districts of Nepal.

We have also featured profiles of a female CO member and a mixed CO who were awarded with the 1999 IDEP (International Day for the Eradication of Poverty) 1999 by UNDP.

Besides these, our regular section Happenings gives a detailed account of major events, and the Headway section updates you on the progress made in the various programme components.

As always we look forward to hearing from you. Your comments and feedback is what would help us streamline our communication efforts and make them even more effective .

Dhanyabaad!

An Overview

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