Strategic Documents and Lessons Learned from West Sumatra Recovery

It’s always a big question after humanitarian efforts in disaster affected area, how to keep all lessons learned, and strategic documents and all sort of that so everyone can easily access it? Bigger disaster and bigger intervention make the question even more valid. In West Sumatra recovery, for instance, there are more than 70 international and national agencies works on recovery following the September 2009 earthquake disaster. Every agency has their experiences, approaches and expertise. It is rich variation on the way each agency undertake the recovery works. But I found out an important component to speed up recovery process those are come from sharing resource and joint effort amongst recovery stakeholders. Other important component to enhance the recovery quality and in the same time reduce the unnecessary cost is the replication on the best practices.

To answer the question above, West Sumatra Recovery Network website http://www.rn-unrc.org collects lessons learned from agencies that carried out recovery effort in west Sumatra. In this website we can find strategic documents produced by working groups such as shelter, disaster risk reduction and other working groups. We can download meeting, workshop and training materials as well so this website is like a living library which its document always regularly updated.

Arwin Soelaksono - Disaster Response and reConstruction

Eco-Friendly Reconstruction

This paper was presented on Training for Facilitators, West Sumatera Post-Earthquake Rehabilitation and Reconstruction, 12-15 May 2010
Abstract:

As part of rebuilding effort following September 30th, 2009, earthquake in West Sumatra, the Government, Society and various Non-Governmental Organization (NGOs), both local and international, launched interventions to help victims of disasters. One form of support is housing reconstruction. Reconstruction and rehabilitation of hundreds of thousands of homes would need a lot of resources including building materials derived from nature. Learning from the cases of Aceh reconstruction, all parties should be wary of the potential environmental damage. Therefore all parties involved in the process of West Sumatra rehabilitation and reconstruction needs to think strategically to balance development efforts with ensuring environmental sustainability. The entire strategic plan must be able to be executed by the whole community and all actors of rehabilitation and reconstruction to protect the environment.

To download all paper content just click here

Arwin Soelaksono - Disaster Response and reConstruction

NGO and Donor Coordination to Speeds up Reconstruction and Avoid NGO Competition

This paper was presented on 4th Anual International Workshop & Expo on Sumatra Tsunami and Recovery . Banda Aceh November 24, 2009.

During 2005-2006, in cities like Banda Aceh, Meulaboh and other parts in West Coast, the presence of Non Government Organizations (NGOs) made these places feel small. These places were crowded of organizations. Nearly everyone was in a high spirit to run their program. Bad things happened when NGOs persuaded beneficiaries to receive someone's program and in the same time reject others.

Conflicting programs amongst NGOs was another problem as a result of the lack of NGO or donor coordination. The presence of one program affected the quality and delivery schedule of other program. When it getting worse the size of the program reduced and impeded. And at the end it created bad attitudes amongst the beneficiaries. There should be a way on strengthening NGO coordination otherwise there will be a hard competition amongst NGO.

Keyword: tsunami, reconstruction, NGO, competition, coordination

To download all paper content just click here.

Arwin Soelaksono - Disaster Response and reConstruction

4 prominent ideas on the rehabilitation works

Another disaster struck Indonesia. The latest, a 7.3 RS earthquake, jolted districts in West Java and one in Central Java. UN-OCHA reported 31,778 houses were severely damaged and 22,453 were moderately damaged in 12 districts in West Java and one district in Central Java. And as WHO Emergency Situation Report released yesterday, public buildings were severely affected as well. 377 schools, 605 religious buildings, 26 office buildings, and 202 health facilities were damaged. WHO also reported 80 dead, 370 suffered from major injuries, 27 missing, and 1,098 people with minor injuries. In total, 157,432 people become IDPs as a result of the September 2, 2009 disaster.

Just in 24 hours, several NGOs and UN agencies flocked to Garut, Ciamis, and Tasikmalaya which area heavily affected the earthquake. The NGOs which deployed their emergency response team and conducted assessment some of them can be described here were Catholic Relief Services, YTBI, Habitat for Humanity, ASB, ECHO, YEU, Oxfam, World Vision, Hope Worldwide, Save the Children, Palang Merah Indonesia, Church World Services, Plan International and Oxfam.

Until today there is no information regarding the exact number on how many building of those were damaged will be rehabilitated or rebuild. Government estimated the cost will amount to between IDR 1.4 trillion and 1.5 trillion. And the reconstruction expected to be completed by the end of February 2010. It can be predicted that there will be a massive rehabilitation work during these 5 months. Based on the experiences from reconstruction or rehabilitation of Aceh Tsunami 2004 and Yogyakarta Earthquake 2006, there are at least 4 prominent ideas should be considered on the rehabilitation works.

Beneficiaries’ participation

Based on the lessons learned from the Tsunami Response (2004-2008) and from Yogyakarta Earthquake (2006) shows beneficiaries and communities participation is the most important component in the program success. Yogyakarta shows huge difference in beneficiaries participation compare to Aceh which lead to the faster result and less cost of reconstruction. This participation brought to a stronger ownership and responsibility. Admittedly there are wide spectrums of participations. The fullest extent is they provide construction material and skilled labors for the rehabilitation of their houses or community infrastructure. On the lowest, they can guard the material or provide access when the construction materials come to their area. The participation can be anything but it should be there. All intervention by NGOs should complemented by their sweat equity. This is the only way if we want to develop mutual respect, synergies and long term cooperation. At the end of the day the communities will be able not only survive when other disaster strike again but have the skills to help other communities surrounding them.

Engineering structural safety

If it comes to safety, all rehabilitation work should apply the engineering concept on structural safety. This becomes more important on the earthquake disaster prone area. Catastrophic failure happens on houses, clinics, schools and other infrastructure buildings which built not follow the engineering code. As per engineering concept, structural elements can be design as ductile elements which absorb earthquake energy. If the earthquake load big enough but within its specified loading code, the elements may be broken but no sudden collapse will happen. In every earthquake shows that buildings without proper engineering design and construction, the structural behave as a brittle material and collapse without any warning to people inside the building to escape.

Local resource
There is no one size fits all intervention by NGO. We can not easily replicate the solution from one area to the other. If we want to rehabilitate or reconstruct housing or other infrastructure we can not just go copying the previous intervention in other area. Each disaster area has its own uniqueness. One of the uniqueness is the local resource. We have to consider skilled builders, construction material, common technology and equipment available on the site. On the structural safety side there is no compromise, it should be followed strictly but for using local resource we have to be innovative. We have to use what is available on site as much as we can otherwise local resource can be idle. We have to balance the appropriateness on engineering and its cost with the local resource availability. These affects to the decision on the engineering side which lead to materials to be used and builders who will works. If we use bigger component from outside the area it will reduce their participation. In this case NGO intervention will be partner in reconstruction to train, supervise and provide management in reconstruction.

Sustainability

The sad part of Aceh's reconstruction is there is no significant and longer-term effect on local economic growth. World Bank reported on Aceh Economic Update in May 2009 that Aceh’s non-oil and gas gross domestic product growth had dropped to 1.9 percent in 2008, far below the national figure of 6.5 percent. When NGOs started their reconstruction works in 2005 the non-oil and gas GDP was 1.2%. Then during the heyday of reconstruction and rehabilitation in 2006 and 2007, the GDP became 7.7% and 7.0%, respectively. But when NGOs phased out in 2008, the GDP plummeted to 1.9%. There are several issues, such as security issues, which made the 7.77 billion USD funding committed for the reconstruction of Aceh and Nias have very minimum impact on sustainability in local economic growth.
To minimize such problems, NGOs have to leave the competition by waving flags and moving forward to form a solid group. This group should produce pressure on every party, which can impede all rehabilitation and reconstruction efforts. The obstruction can be security issues, or improper business practices since a massive reconstruction effort may attract everyone seeks for opportunity and, to some extent, very demanding beneficiaries.

These four ideas mentioned above should be considered before any work on rehabilitation commences. Without these, the rehabilitation effort will be difficult to have a long-term impact and be sustainable.

Arwin Soelaksono - Disaster Response & reConstruction

Cash for Work – one of the challenges for reconstruction work

Not more than two weeks after tsunami stroke Nangroe Aceh Darussalam 2004, the tsunami victim introduced to Cash for Work (CfW). The program developed by humanitarian organization in their relief program is a short-term intervention that would provide temporary employment. When the CfW program commenced there were no other livelihoods, since all economic infrastructures were wiped out. The CfW intervention is an alternative of Food for Work. And it is common in disaster response and post conflict area. The CfW apparently is less cost compare to the Food for Work since this program will not include huge procurement, transportation and storage cost.

In CfW program, the people can be as an employee of the NGO and work on the relief work and receive cash as their payment. A wide range of public project works in this relief operation start from removing corpses, debris, boats to shoreline, cleaning of road and drainage ditches and repair other public facilities as road and bridges as well. Even the worker is not literate or not skilled in this job, they still receive wages as long as they work, and on the earlier operation the salary was paid on daily basis.

In Aceh more than 75,000 people employed by the NGOs who have this program with total more of 8 million USD disbursed. This program has been carried out for more than a year which creates pros and contras among NGOs who work in the relief and mostly reconstruction phase.

the good

It is obvious that economic activity is dying in the devastated area due to a disaster. Tsunami which brought massive destruction in all infrastructures, in a blink of an eye everyone became poor person. Agriculture land flooded with saline water, fishermen’s boats dragged miles away into the city, shops turn to debris as happened with houses as well.

CfW proven as good intervention in this condition since cash infused to the local economy so that business activities start to reside. People regain their hope in a way to try to forget their sorrow start to work. Together with the idle workers they removed corpses, cleaned up agricultural land, drainage ditches, roads and houses. The money which they earned then can be used for their daily needs or as a capital for their business. As long as this program implemented as a short term program before livelihood program or long term economic opportunities, this Cfw was confirmed in stimulating economic activities.

the bad

When it was intended as a temporary intervention, many NGO was not prepared with the works should be done by the participants. Limited expertise of the NGO field staffs in managing the project (including in project design and logistic), made CfW participants left undirected. Many of the CfW participants in idle condition as can be seen they very small work to be done. Or there was no discipline was taken if people just showed up in the time they have to sign the presence list. Some people taken advantage as a ghost worker, they can put in their signature in the list of more than one Cfw program. During the first semester of 2005, CfW is a popular program done by NGOs. And this ghost worker can be understandable happened, since in a neighboring area two NGOs have the same CfW program. All they had to do just jumping around to signed in the list.

The program which intended to be an immediate response to rebuild economic activities became deterioration to the attitude of many people. These people might think that they can earn money easily without hard work or even worse, by cheating as a ghost worker. This sort of problem getting bigger since the implementation of CfW is quite long and made many people get used to it. A new comfort zone was created.

the challenges for reconstruction work

How long CfW program should be done? The answer is always debatable. But for sure this CfW program should be stopped when the reconstruction work commenced.

There are three arguments why CfW may hamper reconstruction works. First, it was difficult to find workers for construction. This is common sense, working in construction works is a hard work. Why people have to choose a harder one if they can earn almost equal amount of money from CfW. From their experience, controls from the supervisors are stricter in the reconstruction work since the number of working people is less compare to CfW and the amount of works are easier to quantify.

The other argument is the competition created higher cost for construction works. One of the characteristic in construction works is continuity. It means the work can not be stop unless the project is completed. It is always costly if we have to stop the work and resume. Every restart takes mobilization cost and in the idle time, the equipments and field staffs still need to be paid regularly. In order to retain workers higher wages should be provided.

The third argument is the beneficiary’s participation was deteriorated. In humanitarian approach when doing intervention including the reconstruction work, beneficiary participation is one of the success key. For example in housing reconstruction, the beneficiary can work as a labor when his house is being reconstructed. He can receive wages for this work and at the same time he built his sense of ownership during the construction. The CfW can distract them to leave working on their housing reconstruction to work in CfW program. In reality, the last argument seems not practical in Aceh reconstruction, since many beneficiaries still working for their houses but working in other livelihood area such as fishermen or farmers.

the recommendation

It is proven that construction work and CfW can not be implemented simultaneously. The nature of the payment itself is different. The CfW pay the participants based on the presence construction worker paid based on the amount of work. The payment for construction work based on unit rate of per each type of work meanwhile the wages of CfW based on how many days he/she is working. If the construction work using the approach of CfW the cost will be very high since every worker don’t have to rush on to achieve the target. They get paid on how many days they are working. On the contrary in the construction work they can get paid less or more – depend on their skills – and there is risk component. In the construction work in the same period of time they can earn less if they are not succeed to complete the job.

Naturally people more attracted to the secured job like CfW compare to construction work. Therefore it is difficult to find worker if in the same area, CfW and construction implemented in the same time.

One of the solution is there should be clear that CfW only short intervention. How long the CW can be implemented it depends on the scale of the disaster, but more than 6 months potentially make the people depended. The CfW should be a preparation and transition to the reconstruction phase. Therefore strong coordination amongst organization should be done to ensure the transition.

The other suggestion is the CfW should located not to close to area which already in reconstruction phase. There is should be some distance, let say 3 hours travel by motorbike, from the CfW area to the construction sites. This separation will obstruct their willingness to go back and forth from their residence or working area to join the CfW.

I believe there will not be a contradiction between implementing CfW and construction works. Both can be done successfully if all parties have strong coordination and clear understanding and enough capacity on managing the program.

Arwin Soelaksono - Disaster Response & reConstruction

Recommendation on reconstruction methodology

In October 2006, I attended a workshop held by the BRR. The workshop, which focused on contractors and construction contracts, was interesting to me. Many of the attendees shared their Catch-22 situation with their contractors. The performance of contractors who did the construction jobs was a big issue then. In the opening remarks, Ray Benson from BRR shared a problem experienced by an NGO. The NGO already paid a big down payment to one of their contractors, but the contractor never showed up with their work. When the NGO pursued the contractor to work, the contractor, on the contrary, threatened the NGO guy with serious intimidation. Ouch!

Due to the enormous house needs, Aceh reconstruction is a big business for contractors. More than 100,000 houses are to be built, and this should be as soon as possible. The tsunami victims became impatient since they had been in tents for almost 2 years. The donors were irritated due to the slow progress of reconstruction. They were chasing the NGOs, who received their funding to fulfill what the NGOs had been promised. These were a perfect chemistry to drive a rush and messy construction job. In the next paragraph, I will explain how bad the situation was.

A bigger part, or almost all NGOs who work in the reconstruction work, are relief NGOs. Their experience is in mobilizing food, medicine, paramedics, water-sanitation work, and temporary shelter. But building a permanent house is a different story. Then, in the end, the work of building a permanent house on a massive scale becomes out of context. This job becomes irrelevant since there are two things that most of these NGOs do not possess. First, if they have this kind of experience, they should have all policies, procedures, and project management systems. All of these systems should be embedded in their org-ware, enabling them to move fast to respond to all the needs on the ground. Second, they don’t have human resources capable enough to handle the job. Come to Aceh merely because of humanity is not enough. Reconstruction people should have project management skills if they want to succeed.

This reconstruction job is a fiesta and a heavy meal from the contractors' side. No wonder they were flooded by BRR with requests for prequalification. In mid-March 2006, 3,088 companies took the prequalification document. There were 2,885 contractors and 203 consultants. It would be unbelievable to compare the number of the same kind of company in Jakarta with many continuous construction jobs. A notary whom we hire for our legal works mentioned that a week before the company profile submission, she received abundant requests for company legal documents. This was miserable. These newborn companies are intended for the sake of winning a contract. They don’t have a past record, which shows they have the capacity to work. And their capability to supply the working capital is a big question mark. It was a common tale that if they could win the contract, they would subcontract to another company to create the 2-tier or even worse. At that time, many NGOs became sitting ducks in front of nasty contractors.

Someone asked me which one is better, using a contractor for the construction or direct implementation using skilled labourers? Both are fine. This is my recommendation; we have to use a contractor and direct implementation using skilled laborers simultaneously. The contractor and the skilled labourers can be like Dr Jeckyl and Mr. Hyde. Sometimes they are good, and sometimes they are corrupt. They can be nice, but they can be ill-behaved at other times. Let say, your contractor done something nasty, you can switch them off and turn the job to skilled labours, and vice versa. The project management discipline can do that. You have to have a strong system and quite some experience to make this kind of move. If you can’t take immediate corrective action supported by the system and enough resources, you can be fooled by the contractors or your skilled laborers. I have shared my best practices for managing skilled laborers (click here) and managing contractors (click here). But merely depending on using just skilled laborers or only using contractors is not enough. We have to combine it. This methodology can increase our productivity and reduce overhead and has already been proven in my work on completing the 4,600 permanent houses in Aceh reconstruction.

Arwin Soelaksono - Disaster Response & reConstruction