Earthquake-hit farmers in Nepal rest hope on polyhouses

In 2015, when the 7.8-Magnitude earthquake in Nepal caused extensive damage to infrastructure and livelihoods of its people, many had lost hope that their lives would ever return to normal. Tek Bahadur, a 60-year-old farmer residing in Kubinde Tol village of Sindhupalchok district, was one of them. His son was killed in a bus accident more than five years ago and the only source of income for him was half-an-acre piece of agricultural land that fetched him an annual income of US $450.

Tek Bahadur can be seen working in his polyhouse 

On the morning of April 25, 2015, one of the worst temblors in 80 years for Nepal completely destroyed Bahadur’s house and left the already Below Poverty Line farmer destitute and in need of dire help. The following year, Bahadur came to know that Pragya was initiating the construction of poly houses to enable production of off-season vegetables for the households, under its Rebuilding Rural Nepal program. “For a farmer like me who had lost everything, a proposal to construct a polyhouse in his own land has brought a glimmer of hope,” says Bahadur. He was then encouraged to attend trainings that will impart  technical skills and knowledge to take forward the polyhouses that would be set up by Pragya.

Today, Bahadur treats the set up as his own physical asset for an increased livelihood and is trying his hand at growing both seasonal and off-seasonal vegetables. He and fellow beneficiaries have gained profits by selling the produce in nearby markets.

“Tomatoes, and more tomatoes in my field”

A polyhouse set up in Majhi's field

Kamala Majhi, a 35-year old female farmer in Sindhupalchowk, was another victim left empty handed by the earthquake. “Our house got damaged and utensils were found within the rubbles and we lost all means to make money,” says Majhi who was also a beneficiary of Pragya’s initiative to construct polyhouses in 100 plots, after stringent site and beneficiary assessment for selecting the most needy households.

Majhi has a polyhouse constructed in a rented piece of land where she has sowed some tomato seeds. “I am convinced that tomatoes will have higher yield than other vegetables and I know I will have many tomatoes to sell in the market,” says the farmer.

World Humanitarian Day 2016: challenges across the globe

The World Humanitarian Summit held in Istanbul, Turkey in May earlier this year brought together politicians, civil society groups and aid organizations to address the challenges that the global humanitarian agencies face. The Secretary General of the United Nations, Mr Ban Ki-moon structured the summit around five key agendas: “ending conflict; respecting the rules of war; leaving no one behind on the sustainable development agenda; working differently to end need, and investing in humanity.” The summit comes at a time when the wide displacement of people due to conflicts in Syria, Yemen and Iraq, has led to a global refugee crisis, and has become a contentious issue in the politics of the Global North. Equally worrying is the targeting of aid workers in conflict regions, in direct contravention of the International Humanitarian Law.

In other parts in the world, large-scale disasters are are increasingly complicit with a volatile regime of climate change. A prolonged drought in Central India leading to a water crisis and subsequent farmer suicides was immediately followed by large-scale flooding in the North India, primarily the states of Assam and Bihar, with over 4.2 million people affected. In June, heavy rains in the mountain regions of Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh in India caused entire villages to be washed away.

When taken as a whole, the picture of the humanitarian crisis that emerges is of large-scale displacement due to political conflicts and war, and the incipient humanitarian crisis of developing countries that are increasingly affected by disasters and climate change. Yet, in the vitiated political discourse and the partisan response to the global refugee crisis, it is the poor, marginalized, and vulnerable sections of society - women, children, tribal communities - that are most affected. Across the globe, international organizations face challenges in responding to crises, whose roots are often political in nature, and the inability to deal with events that transcend national boundaries. A divided response from the global community in the face of any humanitarian crisis, whether caused by political conflicts or natural disasters, denies the shared humanity and the common kinship that people share with each other.

  

3rd Anniversary of the Uttarakhand floods

17 June marked the third anniversary of the Uttarakhand floods that killed more than 5000 people and left the infrastructure of the state in shambles. The intensity of the floods was such that the state government has not been able to arrive at a number of ‘official’ deaths in the disaster, with many families of the deceased yet to receive a death certificate.

In the aftermath of the disaster, a report by the National Institute of Disaster Management (NIDM) has indicated that unregulated construction of dams in the Alaknanda and Mandakini basins, along with adverse weather conditions, could have led to the flooding.  Human intervention is increasingly seen to be the cause of disasters in the Uttarakahand, with recent reports that the fire in April 2016 leading to a large-scale destruction of trees and forest cover could have been man made.

Despite the widespread destruction of infrastructure and huge toll of the floods in the state, there are signs of recovery: people are making their way back to the pilgrimage site of Kedarnath, and the ‘Valley of flowers’, a popular tourist destination, opened to the public for the first time in 3 years. There are untold stories of the strength and resilience of survivors in the face of calamity, everyday individuals building their lives from scratch, after they saw it washed away three years ago.

Pragya has been working to rehabilitate the livelihoods of the people in the areas that are worst affected by the floods, by providing the people with alternate sources of income, in a state whose economy is geared toward revenue from tourism. We are also piloting a grassroots, citizen - led early warning system to be implemented in the districts of the Uttarakhand in the coming year. 3 years on, we remember all the people who lost their lives in this tragedy, and the lessons remain clear: concerted conservation efforts and minimizing human intervention in the environment are a necessity if we are to avoid tragedy on such a scale in the near future.