Thar Drought 2002-3

Thar Drought 2002-3
(Drought Alert-4)

Case Study-1

Here is a case of one widow named Lalan aged 35, with five dependent children. She has no land and depend for livelihood by doing manual work for other families in her village Bitra. She normally earns her living to sustain herself and children by doing embroidery work, selling fire wood and mud plastering of neighbours’ houses. In normal time she earns just enough to feed herself and children food which is not nutritious. She is some time paid in cash and sometime in kind like wheat flour for making bread. In the current drought she has lost her two goat which was her only asset due to non-availability of fodder. None of the five children (3 girls, 2 boys) go to school as she cannot afford the cost of schooling.

As the rainfall did not occur last year, there is a drought in Thar. 80% of the households have lost all means of livelihood and more than 50% have migrated to canal irrigated areas out of Thar in search of food and fodder.

Lalan did not migrate to canal irrigated areas as she saw no prospects of earning and feeding her children there. She is now entirely at the mercy of the village people who help her out sometime with wheat flour to make bread for her five dependent children. She produces embroidery work but no one is ready to buy due to shortage of money. The middle man would come around and buy it from me at the rate which is not even 1/4^th the normal day rate. I have no option but to sell as I want to buy food items for my hungry children, says Lalan.

The children go out in the morning and cut fire wood which they sell in town. They are paid less than half its rate as people know that they are in dire need of money for food and will sell them at this rate. They are exploited by every one due to the prevailing drought situation. Some time when we have no income from craft and fire wood we resort to begging in the village. Some time we are lucky to get some wheat flour which provide us one time meal. Many times children and myself sleep without taking any meal, say Lalan. Lalan further said that they are looking forward to harvesting wild fruits and vegetables (fodder tree pods) which will be ready in two to three months time. We will use these to satisfy our hunger, says Lalan.

PVDP in collaboration with Church World Service (CWS) is trying to find outlet for Thari craft so that persons like Lalan can earn a decent living. We are trying to bring change in the pattern, design and quality of Thari craft so that the market will buy it at a reasonable price. In the process, we would like to reduce the role of middle men who normally exploits the craft workers by paying them unfair wages for their hard labour, says Mr. Dominic Stephen, President of PVDP.

PVDP and its partners are looking at ways and means to help the drought affected people in Thar. For short term intervention food items are needed badly for the people who have not migrated. There is also an immediate need of fodder for the livestock. For medium term intervention, there is a need to build their assets and rehabilitate their water systems which are badly affected in drought years. Rain water harvesting tanks are needed to store sweet rain water. This is important as 80% of the deep water wells in PVDP have brackish water which is harmful for health. The community water wells need to be repaired as after being in use for long time (some over 50 years) they badly need repairs and renovation with community support. The community water ponds are also in bad shape and need to be de-silted enabling more rainwater storage for livestock use. In drought time, the livestock is in danger of dying due to fodder and water shortages, they need to be managed well and vaccinated timely to save the farmers from suffering huge losses.

Dominic Stephen
President,
Participatory Village Development Programme(PVDP)
Thar Region, Sindh, Pakistan.
30^th January 2003.




Thar Drought 2002-3. Case Study-2.
This is a case of Khimo Dano aged 50 from Village Sonal Boh. Khimo has a family of seven members to support. Khimso has his wife, his old father and mother and four dependent children. His source of income is manual labour in Islamkot town which is about 15 km from his village. He earns around Rs. 1000 (17 US$) monthly from doing manual labour where as his monthly cost of simple food items is about 2500( 42 US$) . His two small children work in carpet loom factory and earn about Rs. 500/- (8.5 US$) each a month. His two daughters collect fire wood which is sold by Khimo in Islamkot town. The daughters also pick leaves of trees which is sold as fodder in the town. All these casual earning activities help them to satisfy the very basic food need of Khimo family. Non of the children go to school as Khimo cannot afford the cost of schooling. With income earn from all sources we can hardly buy wheat flour, tea and sugar. We are unable to afford nutrient meal composed of cooking oil, pulses, meat and milk. We have no land and no livestock so we also do not get loan from money lenders. We have no jewellery which we can pound to get some credit, says Khimo. He also says that some time when he does not get casual labour job and his sons are not employed by carpet contractors, they have to adjust their daily food intake. Instead of three meals, they take only two, sometime just one if worse come to worse. We also resort to eating wild fruits and vegetables when the bad times come. It equal to eating grasses, say Khimo.
Due to poor diet Khimo’s children remain weak and sick. Their growth is badly affected due to food shortages. Khimo is worried that if this continues, the family will suffer more. He leaves early morning after taking a cup of tea looking for casual labour. He knows that if he does not get work, his family will have to go without food. The small earning of children from carpet and selling of fire wood bring very little income to afford not even tea which they must take to keep their body and soul together. The current drought situation has made matter still worse. The casual labour wage rate has fallen as there are more unemployed persons who are willing to work for less wages. On the other hand the food item rates have gone up more than 30%. The rates of animals have drastically fallen as the animals are physically weak due to lack of fodder and the traders are not ready to buy them. Taking advantage of peoples’ poor condition and urge for food, people buy fire wood and leaves of trees for fodder at less than half the rates. Government has not done much to alleviate or even reduce the sufferings of drought affected people. The NGOs have also not done anything yet to address the problems created by inset of drought in Thar desert. PVDP is working with its partner organizations to find a sustainable solution to the livelihood problem of the people affected by recurring droughts. The options are few but there are opportunities which are not rain dependent like handicraft. This can be explored and people can be engaged in making handicraft for living. Drought mitigation and rehabilitation plans are also made by PVDP and its partners (subject to availability of funds) in which, poor households will be helped with building rainwater harvesting tanks to store rainwater for drinking purposes. Other activities planned include repairs and renovation of community water wells, de-silting of community water ponds and animal vaccination and provision of fodder in drought hit areas. These are all medium term interventions, however what is immediately required is the food commodities for people who have not migrated and fodder for their animals. By Dominic Stephen President, Participatory Village Development Programme (PVDP) Thar Region, Sindh, Pakistan. 30^th January 2003.