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Rural Community Infrastructure Works (RCIW) Programme

RCIW Objectives
RCIW Beneficiary Communities
RCIW Concept
RCIW Districts
RCIW Organisational Structure
RCIW Partners
Resource Mobilisation

RCIW Objectives
Generating long-term food security

The overall development objective of RCIW is to improve the livelihoods of the 50,000 households most vulnerable to food insecurity, living in the most food-deficit districts. RCIW’s immediate objectives are to enable poor people to obtain and maintain assets that increase the availability of food and income in their community and the individual households.

The activities of RCIW aim to improve several factors contributing to food security

•	Development, self-help, potential of the RCIW target group population
•	Food and income available to households
•	Road and trail networks in RCIW intervention areas
•	Natural resource base
•	Planning, implementation, and operational capacities of RCIW partner organisations.

To achieve this, the RCIW partners provide food grains as temporary assistance to poor households in exchange for labour on Food-for-Work projects. They also provide the local User Committee managing the project with construction materials, farm inputs, tools, technical and managerial expertise, and training to enhance the capacity of the communities.

The integrated approach of RCIW aims to build the capacity of impoverished households and communities in the target group to generate long-term food security. RCIW also aims to improve the capacity to deliver services by providing training and extension aids to private and public organisations and institutions including DDCs, VDCs, locally operating partner NGOs, and consultants.

RCIW Beneficiary Communities

Specific situations to be addressed in different regions

RCIW strives to assist the 300,000 most vulnerable and food deficit households, which are usually socially and economically marginalised. These families possess little or no arable land, are illiterate, and are without employment. They are usually just getting enough food to survive. Hence, it is necessary to provide some external sustenance, as food or cash, which enables them to participate in social and economic development activities to build their self-help capacity and assets.

Women are an important RCIW target group, because they fulfil key functions in food production and preparation, in family care, and often as the heads of households, responsible for the social and economic development of all household members. Poverty particularly affects women due to their heavy workload, pregnancy and nursing babies, lack of control of the income to which they contribute; and limited access to political participation, education, resources, and mobility.

Nepal has a growing problem of food insecurity. For generations, population growth has resulted in the division of family landholdings until now; they are too small and fragmented to support a household. With declining productivity and increasing population, the production of food less per capita is decreasing.
Solutions to the problem of food insecurity are hindered by several factors. The lack of rural roads limits the use of improved agricultural inputs to improve production, the transportation of food to these areas, and the distribution of food within these areas. It also restricts opportunities for employment and income generation. Irrigation is inadequate despite Nepal’s abundant water resources. The effects of the political situation have also worsened the food insecurity problem in Nepal. In the Terai districts that produce an overall food surplus, it is easier and cheaper to sell the grains to the Indian market rather than to the severely food-deficit hill districts.

Of the beneficiaries targeted by RCIW, about 50% live in the Terai lowlands where the population is extremely high, 40% are in the hills, and 10% in the highlands of the western Karnali Zone. Many of these people are regarded as “low” caste (Dalits).

RCIW Concept

Enabling communities to build the collective capability for future food
security

RCIW’s integrated food security concept focuses on directly addressing constraints on food availability and people’s access to food.
In the short term, RCIW aims to alleviate the temporary food shortages of disadvantaged people through Food-for-Work (FfW) so that they are able to invest time in their own long-term development. It mobilises individuals, groups, and communities to create the productive and social framework, such as roads, plantations, and rural financial systems, required for long-term food security.
RCIW uses Food-for-Work in combination with varying amounts of other interventions and instruments, such as savings-and-credit, the introduction of cash crops, skill development, and adult literacy and advocacy activities. It uses social mobilisation as a means to launch these activities. For each User Group, RCIW customises the blend of development interventions and instruments that it uses depending on the:
• Actual problems facing the target groups,
• Development potential available, and
• Prevalent socio-political circumstances in the given community or district.

Through ongoing social mobilisation, RCIW aims to enable a group to assert its right to have the inputs from service providers that make it possible for the members to participate effectively in the development process. These self-help groups strive to create a situation where the poor become empowered socially and economically.

RCIW sees the development process of groups in three stages:

1.	The formation of primary self-help groups such as FfW User Groups, saving-and-credit groups, Participatory Learning and Action (PLA) groups,
2.	The graduation of primary self-help groups into community-based organisations (CBOs) that are formally recognised by the DDCs, and
3.	The alliance of cooperating CBOs into NGOs or cooperatives.

RCIW uses the services of locally operating NGOs hired by GTZ or other technical assistance providers to offer guidance and support to poor rural communities in four areas:
• Creation of self-help groups,
• Mobilisation of internal and external resources,
• Human development, and
• Linking groups among themselves and with external service providers.

RCIW Districts

Working in the most food insecure areas

Working in the most food insecure areas In 2001/02, RCIW worked in 34 districts, thirty of which are “core” districts where RCIW concentrates its resources and technical support for the entire duration of Phase II. Within each district, 5 to 15 VDCs have been selected for RCIW support. The districts are grouped into clusters based on their geographic proximity and the technical assistance provider.

RCIW Organisational Structure

Self-help groups are at the focal point of RCIW with their development
demands

The main organisations and partners within the structure of RCIW are:

•	each of the VDCs, NGOs, and User Groups (UGs)/ Self-help Groups (SHGs)/ Community-based Organisations (CBOs) at the community level;
•	each of the 30 District Development Committees (DDCs) with the DPSU and technical assistance provider at the district level;
•	The Ministry of Local Development (MLD), World Food Programme (WFP) and the German Agency for Technical Assistance (GTZ) at the central level. Thus far, the structure for the implementation of RCIW has proven to be adequate and sufficiently flexible to make the adjustments necessary to cope with the insurgency problem. However, in order to continue to carry out the interventions effectively in some areas most affected by the insurgency, there are indications that the RCIW management may need to make some structural adjustments, such as changes in the mode of delivery of services.

Roles and responsibilities of main RCIW Partners:

Main RCIW Partners	Main provisions and responsibilities
Ministry of Local Development (MLD)	· Services to guide, coordinate, and manage RCIW · Personnel (technicians, administrators and support   staff) · Funds for construction materials and for rice   transportation, storage, and handling
World Food Programme (WFP):	· Rice to remunerate workers in FfW projects · Tools, equipment, and rice storage facilities · Advice to partners on food aid management,   targeting benefits, and monitoring results · Funds for rice transportation, storage, and handling
Technical Assistance (GTZ)	· Technical expertise in all relevant fields · Facilitation to plan and conduct trainings and assist   in human resource and organisational development · Assistance in policy formulation, coordination,   and monitoring· Institutional capacity building · Advisory and monitoring services
Districts (DPSU)	· Coordination, planning, and monitoring of RCIW   activities · Matching funds for graveling and maintenance of   large FfW projects (roads, river embankments) · Technical expertise especially in engineering · Procurement of construction material
Communities and Village Development Committees (VDC)	· Funds as partial remuneration for workers in FfW   projects · Funds to maintain large FfW projects   (roads, river embankments) · Land for FfW projects like roads, fruit-tree   plantations etc.
NGOs	· Facilitation of the social mobilisation process · Training and guiding target group and individual    initiatives · Training and guiding target groups
Self-help groups	· Planning, implementation, and operation of their   chosen development activities

RCIW Partners

Fostering new partnerships on all levels and responding to the
emergency situation

To achieve its goal of food security, RCIW initiated a complex process that requires the committed endeavours of the government, civil society, private sector, and international community. Hence, building partnerships is one of the main activities of the RCIW management.
It has established partnerships with other donor agencies to extend the coverage and scope of its interventions. To meet the demand of the members of the target group for services and development activities, it is constantly establishing partnerships with various public and private organizations.

At the central level, the three main partners in RCIW (MLD, WFP, and GTZ-IFSP) have set up and intensified additional partnerships with several donors, projects, and programmes, to enhance the capacity of RCIW to offer technical assistance and financing.

At the operational level, RCIW has intensified its partnerships with the following organisations and programmes in order to implement its activities more comprehensively.

At the district and community level, RCIW has initiated and strengthened partnerships with many new VDCs, locally operating NGOs, and line ministries. The task of fostering and strengthening these partnerships has been challenging but also rewarding. Without these many new partnerships, RCIW would not have been able to fulfil its obligations.
With these partners, RCIW has jointly implemented planning and assessment missions and, in many instances, even shared resources. The main collaborations are:

•	SAPROS and DEPROSC - two national NGOs – that provide technical assistance for RCIW in the districts of Makawanpur, Bajhang, Bajura, and Baitadi through financing by DANIDA.
•	Local Governance Programme (LGDP), supported by UNDP, in Dhanusha, Dadeldhura, and Udayapur, with which RCIW collaborates and jointly implements activities.
•	District Development Programme (DPP), supported by SVN, to strengthen operations in Cluster VI (Karnali zone).
•	District Roads Support Project (DRSP), supported by SDC, to strengthen operations in the Cluster V (Dolakha, Kavre, Sindhupalchok and Ramechap).
•	WIN-Project of FAO in the districts Kanchanpur, Kailali, and Doti.
•	Rural Access Programme (RAP), funded by DFID, which jointly implements activities with RCIW in the districts of Achham, Doti, and Dailekh.

Donor Assistance to RCIW

RCIW partners	Main provisions	Main areas of intervention
WFP	food as rice	All RCIW districts
German Government	financial and technical assistance	Cluster I, II, and IV (15 districts)
British Government (DFID)	financial and technical assistance	Cluster II, V, VI and VII (15 districts)
Danish Government (DANIDA)	technical assistance	Cluster VII (4 districts)

Resource Mobilisation

RCIW is one of the most capital-intensive national poverty alleviation programmes in Nepal. It involves numerous transfers of substantial amounts of financial and physical resources, mostly food and construction material, to the local government and the target groups.

The total estimated annual costs for the programme are about Rs 8 million. In the past, HMG contributed more than 30% of total programme costs. Over the last two years, HMG has not able to fulfil its financial commitment due to the rapidly worsening revenue and internal security situation.

Mobilisation of resources by the target group, their local communities, and VDCs and DDCs has also decreased relative to the previous years. For instance, more than 50% of the partner VDCs, and many DDCs were not able to fulfil their commitments to the programme. As a result, most workers who engaged in FfW activities received smaller payments than planned and expected. This in turn further decreased their capacities to make internal investments such as saving-and-credit. In addition, larger capital-intensive FfW investments were postponed or cancelled.

Due to these gaps in financing, the RCIW partners were compelled to mobilise additional financial resources and form new partnerships with various donors. RCIW was fortunate to receive additional funding from DFID, the German Government, and DANIDA in 2001-02. The additional donor assistance, especially technical assistance, helped to link activities to develop physical assets with activities to build the institutional capacity of all levels -- a precondition to ensuring the sustainable management of the assets.

For more details about RCIW view this PDF-File