PREFACE

   
When VDP was initiated in selected two VDCs of PDDP districts in mid-1996 in a phase-wise manner, we knew right then that this programme would change the way local development was planned and managed in Nepal. But we had not expected that the programme would bring forth the results we are witnessing now - the effects at the national level, as well as the impacts at the personal level of the rural poor, within such a short period of time.

At the national level, the very fact that VDP has become a national model and strategy for poverty alleviation initiatives speaks volumes about the significance attached by the Government of Nepal and UNDP in their respective programmes. The latter has replicated the programme in its other programmes/projects, and other UN agencies are also tapping on to the socially mobilized communities to implement their specific programmes.

VDP is now being implemented in 175 VDCs of 19 districts supported by PDDP. Six districts have expanded the VDP in 20 VDCs each, through NORAD’s support. Such has been the impact, that some of the districts have even initiated the expansion phase through their own resources. PDDP targets to cover 200 VDCs of 20 districts before the start of the new millennium.

Information collected and analysis made thereof, till the second reporting quarter of this year, show that the progress, effects and impacts made by the programme at the national, district, village, community and personal levels are very significant. The programme has proved, beyond any doubt, that the poor can launch micro-finance initiatives. Rural Nepalis have been generating community asset through their savings every week in their organization, and have now realized that they need not depend upon others for their ordinary fiscal needs. They have found that they no longer need to go to the tyrannical local moneylenders with their sky-high interest rates - with some of them charging upto 60% interest. Data shows that the interest rates have gone down significantly. In fact, in the two sampled VDCs of Parbat, the moneylenders went out of business altogether.

When the data of the baseline survey taken in 1996 is compared with the data collected in June 1999, one can also see the change in status of the poorest to poor, and the poor to medium, in the poverty profile drawn by the community organizations themselves. The data also indicate more girls and boys attending school, and less girls dropping out of school. Health and sanitation have been accorded high priority by the communities, and one witnesses a dramatic rise in the number of pit latrines being constructed and the increase in the number of traditional birth attendants in the villages. This implies that the rural poor are not only thinking about themselves but also developing their villages through the formation of "social capital."

One of the singular impacts shown by the programme is in women’s participation in decision-making processes and the resultant rise in their self-empowerment. With equal access to credit, more and more women have started venturing into entrepreneurial activities, that they previously shied away from. More and more women are becoming functional literates and they have been developing their skills through various means. It is because the women have grouped together that they have collectively campaigned against alcoholism and gambling. They have shown that when given the opportunity, they do not fall behind men in conducting social activities… whether it is rehabilitating trails, constructing community buildings or schools, or leading the groups.

VDP has shown that when people unite together, they rise above individualism and start thinking of the community as a whole. They have proved that the effective mobilization of social capital is what paves the way for the proper utilization of physical and human capital. Social capital is the fabric of decentralized local development, and VDP has demonstrated that local development in the real sense is the outcome of collective actions of the people at the grassroots. And it is slowly but gradually leading to Sustainable Human Development in Nepal.
  

Back