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NEPAL: Aid Must Double to Even Approach MDGs

Marty Logan

KATHMANDU, Oct 17 2006 (IPS) - Nepal needs to double its foreign aid to 7.9 billion US dollars if it wants to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)set out by the United Nations, but more cash alone will not solve the country’s development needs.

A 10-year insurgency by Maoist rebels has had a “very deep impact on development”, said Jagadish Chandra Pokharel, vice-chairman of the National Planning Commission (NPC) at the release of Nepal’s MDG assessment report, Tuesday.

“We have been talking (about reconstruction) as if we would rebuild a couple of facilities and reintegrate those who had taken guns to the jungle and those who had fled their homes, and that would be enough. But reconstruction will require much more deeper debate and analysis,” added Pokharel.

For example, in Jumla, one of Nepal’s most remote, high-altitude districts, experts have worked for years to successfully cross-breed local goats and sheep with varieties from New Zealand and Australia. According to Pokharel, “If I were to devise a (development) package for Jumla I might assume that that breeding ‘infrastructure’ exists but that would be wrong; none of those goats now exist – they have been eaten.”

‘’To rebuild that (programme) would take another couple of years.” A small nation sandwiched between giants China and India, Nepal will actually need to spend 16.4 billion dollars to achieve the eight MDGs by the target date of 2015. But 4.8 billion dollars will come from government sources and 3.8 billion from households, communities and the private sector, says ‘Needs Assessment for Nepal’, published by the NPC and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

The MDGs were devised at a summit of the world’s governments in 2000. They include halving the number of the world’s people who live on less then a dollar a day, providing primary schooling for every child and reversing the spread of HIV/AIDS by 2015.

A 2005 progress report found that Nepal, one of South Asia’s four least developed countries (LDCs), was moving towards some targets but falling away from others. It was on track to reach the goal of boosting the enrolment of girls in schools and to cut the number of women who die in childbirth but regressing in slowing the spread of HIV/AIDS and providing safe drinking water to people living in towns and cities.

Last week NPC’s former vice-chairman, Shankar Sharma, predicted the country would attain 50-60 percent of the MDGs by 2015.

He also suggested that Nepal follow the lead of other developing countries like Thailand and Cambodia and devise an ‘MDG-Plus’, to include one or more goals reflecting its unique development needs.

The assessment does that, estimating the resources needed to develop basic infrastructure like roads and electricity, in rural Nepal. It also forecasts how much will have to be spent on specific activities to promote gender equality.

“The largest proportion of the public investment will have to be allocated to the education sector followed by hunger-related activities,” says the assessment. “However, in terms of the financing gap it is the hunger-related activities where the need is greatest. This is because of the relatively low allocation to sectors such as agriculture and irrigation at present.”

In fact, the U.N.’s World Food Programme is now carrying out an emergency feeding programme in 10 districts in the northwest where ‘food gaps’ between crops have long tested villagers’ resilience. Last winter was the area’s driest on record and left many homes’ food cupboards bare, prompting WFP’s first ever emergency project in Nepal.

As much as 25 percent of the nation’s population has insufficient food, reported the chief of the Department of Agriculture on Monday. Because of droughts in some areas and floods in others, the production of rice, the staple crop, will fall by 300,000 tonnes in 2006-07, predicted Dip Bahadur Swanr, reported ‘The Himalayan Times’ newspaper.

Minister of Finance Ram Sharan Mahat said Tuesday that such problems require a holistic response. “Hunger, I don’t think, can be isolated from other activities like rural infrastructure works.once these are in place, it will generate income, which is what you need to banish hunger”, he said at the report’s release.

“With sustainable peace in sight, I think we must accelerate our activities and programmes,” added Mahat.

Peace talks between government and Maoist leaders did not reach an expected breakthrough Sunday but another session is expected within a week and > officials on both sides remain upbeat about succeeding.

But such a deal might not bring immediate relief to development workers in rural areas who are being increasingly intimidated by Maoist cadres, despite a ceasefire being in place since April’s “people’s movement” ended the direct rule of King Gyanendra.

UN resident representative Matthew Kahane told IPS on Tuesday that he met Maoist leaders Friday to discuss the problem. “They said ‘once there is a political settlement, we will be able to deal with this’. But when you’ve got people who have been playing a politically strong role they don’t give that up easily unless it’s to become the official power,” added Kahane.