Supplies donated by Eros Spa in Yangon are loaded onto a boat in Pyapon for distribution to cyclone survivors last week. Pic: Hein Latt Aung

U BA Aye’s eyes stare proudly from the photograph. His face talks of struggles but also of resilience. With cash from a work scheme run by a local nongovernmental organisation, U Ba Aye fixed the fence around his house and bought wood to build a new plough.

His photo was shown by a Pact Myanmar supporter as an example of just one of many delta residents who has managed to transform the relief he has received in the wake of cyclone Nargis into an asset that will help him survive and look after his family in the long term.

Efforts to provide for the 2.4 million people affected by the cyclone have left little time for theoretical discussions of why or how relief is working for the long-term development of the region.

But an examination of the form of aid and relief that international and local NGOs are choosing, points towards a more complex understanding of how the injection of relief money and aid can work to provide for families and villages in years to come.

“Twenty years ago there was what you can refer to as the ‘truck and chuck’ principal, where you drive in with a pile of food and you throw it out of the back of the truck and you walk away and you say, ‘There we go. That village is sorted’,” said Ashley Clements, a spokesperson for the US-based World Vision.

“Now we have a much better understanding of what the implications of that activity are,” he said.

The argument goes that relief can consist of more than just a one-time handout and if done carefully can prevent the development of a relationship of dependency between donors and disaster victims.

According to the spokesperson of an INGO that funds Pact Myanmar, cash transfers and cash-for-work schemes are concrete methods of supporting the long-term development of communities and local economies.

“People can buy bullocks or goats, or material to fix their roofs, or a tool for harvesting,” the spokesperson said.

Giving cash can also be more efficient. Pact Myanmar initially allocated US$30 per family per 15 days through a combination of food and cash. But after the costs of packaging, transporting and distributing food were taken into account, families only received the equivalent of $20. When money was given direct to the families, they received the full $30.

Pact Myanmar is not the only organisation employing this policy. Save the Children, World Food Program and many private donors involved in relief efforts have all given cash directly to those affected by Nargis.

World Vision, which has been handing out money directly, is now also considering a cash-for-work scheme in the delta region.

Mr Clements explained that this would effectively mean paying local people to rebuild the key buildings and infrastructure in their villages. This would reduce the risk of dependency on NGOs and help support families in the period before the local economy starts functioning normally.

“This is critical for a village to get back on its feet and for people to rebuild their lives. An injection of cash into the economy is necessary to keep up people’s nutritional intake and provide a few basic commodities to get their life back on track,” he said.

“International NGOs are often accused of being too prescriptive in their aid. This allows people to choose.”

But cash is only an option if there is some sort of market operating in the area. For World Vision’s programs in Yangon Division this wasn’t a problem, Mr Clements said.

“The markets were working. Food was available. So physically handing out food was going to be destructive to the economy – to the merchants and to the farmers who were getting food into the city,” he said.

Other NGOs, like Germany’s Welt Hunger Hilfe, have found cash transfers impossible because there are no markets in the areas where they operate.

“We are not doing it now because in the area we are working, the markets are not functioning. The people would need to travel a long way to reach the market,” said Welt Hunger Hilfe’s Myanmar country director, Angela Schwarz.

“[But] for NGOs, giving out cash is logistically better and it also encourages the market to grow, to return to the area. The money will draw the private traders.”
In the worst-hit areas, she said, it may be two or three months before markets are functioning again – but this will depend on the return of a reliable transport system.

“It really depends on the area. … Those areas that are only reachable by boat, the more remote areas, it might take longer than two or three months,” Ms Schwarz said. “A lot of the normal transport boats are not running and might have been lost in the storm, so for the market to return the transport system needs to be functioning.”

A major goal of Welt Hunger Hilfe’s aid proposal, which is in the process of being approved by the government, is turning aid into assets.

“Creating assets is of course very important so people can start their livelihoods again and not be dependent on outside help. But here in Myanmar, we see far less risk of dependency,” Ms Schwarz said. “People here want to get back to work again.”

Welt Hunger Hilfe is concentrating on getting the agricultural and fishing sectors back up and running in their area of the delta, which encompasses 36,000 people, while reducing the reliance on agriculture.

“We are also focusing on promoting non-agricultural economic activities because only 30 percent of the people in our area are landowners. The rest are mostly day labourers, often in rice fields or sometimes in the fishing industry,” she said.

But Welt Hunger Hilfe is also using its agricultural expertise to diversify the crops that are being cultivated to make the area more efficient and profitable.

“After the monsoon the farmers cannot grow rice, so oil crops like sesame oil and also vegetables can be grown. This will mean they have something to eat but also, when the markets are functioning again, they might have something to sell,” Ms Schwarz said.

Avoiding a culture of dependency and fostering independence is not only important economically but also psychologically.

“At the moment we see it as important psychologically that [farmers] are at least growing something, that they are not just sitting around with nothing to do,” said Ms Schwarz. “People need to try and go back to a normal life as soon as they can.”