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Philippines: World Bank to deal directly with NGOs

Ramon Isberto

An Inter Press Service Feature

MANILA, Apr 13 (IPS) - The World Bank is about to approve a biodiversity protection programme in the Philippines that will for the first time put a big kitty of official aid money in the hands of a consortium of non-governmental organisations (NGOs).

If it works out, the programme could have global implications. More donor governments and multilateral agencies may find it more cost-effective to channel funds directly to NGOs in poor nations rather than to governments of these states or to Northern NGOs.

Under an agreement that is expected to be finalised and signed in May, the World Bank will fund a seven-year, 20-million-dollar project to set up a network of 10 protected areas nationwide.

The grant money will come from the Global Environmental Facility (GEF) which is being administered by the World Bank.

The bulk of the grant funds, about 17 million dollars, will be administered by a consortium of Philippine NGOs called NGOs for Integrated Protected Areas (NIPA).

''We usually deal with governments,'' Thomas Allen, the World Bank resident representative in Manila, told IPS. ''This is the first time the bank will channel funds of a significant amount directly to an NGO.''

As if to underscore the potential importance of the project, World Bank president Lewis Prestone took the unusual step of meeting with NIPA officials during his March visit to Manila.

The NIPA project is part of a larger programme aimed at helping the Philippines to conserve its biodiversity resources, considered by experts to among the richest in the world.

The country's present national parks system, consisting of over 61 parks and wildlife sanctuaries, exists only on paper.

Virtually unprotected, the rare animals and plants in its tropical forests, wetlands and surrounding seas are being rapidly destroyed by logging, fishing, pollution and human encroachment.

Under the government's National Integrated Protection Areas System (NIPAS), 10 priority areas representing different ''bio- geographic zones'' have been selected for development.

NGOs have been called in to help organise people living in or around the protected areas to support conservation efforts.

Their biggest job will to be set up livelihood projects for people in the area, many of whom are members of cultural communities. About 10 million dollars, or 60 percent of the project's total funding, has been allocated for this purpose.

NGOs are being tapped because they are less bureaucratic and have far better ''people skills'' than heavy-handed government agencies.

So far, Manila's bureaucrats have not resisted the growing role of NGOs. Government officials, says Allen, have been ''very closely involved in designing the (NIPA) programme''.

Moreover, the government's attitude towards NGO participation in development programmes in general seems quite positive. Economic Planning Secretary Cielito Habito says up to 20 percent of aid funds may eventually be channeled to NGOs.

International agencies started funneling aid funds through Philippine NGOs in the late 1980s. The Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) for example has funded three NGO consortiums to the tune of about 19 million dollars.

It remains unclear whether Manila will remain as cooperative in the future if NGOs get a fatter share of aid funds. So far, the government's interests seem adequately protected.

NIPA's funds will be deposited in a government bank, the Land Bank, and environmental officials will have a hand in screening proposed NGO livelihood projects in the 10 pilot sites.

Moreover, state agencies are probably relieved they do not have to take on the politically sensitive and physically difficult job of organising people in the proposed protected areas which are often the most inaccessible parts of the country.

But NGOs in rich countries, which have traditionally functioned as conduits for donor funds to NGOs in poor countries, may find the NIPA experiment a bit worrisome.

In recent years, as NGOs in the South have become more organised and sophisticated, donor agencies have shown growing interest in funding these groups directly rather than relying on Northern NGOs to allocate these funds.

In the case of the NIPA project, the original proposal in fact provided that it would be administered by the Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF).

That proposal, however, ran into strong opposition from several NGOs, which argued the project should be managed by Philippines groups. Philippine Environmental Secretary Angel Alcala agreed and late last year the World Bank went along too.

To meet the World Bank's requirements, interested NGOs formed a consortium in December and began negotiations for a detailed agreement. Both sides say an accord is almost ready.

The problem now is to make NIPA work and that will be a tall order.

NIPA is composed of 17 organisations and umbrella groups of various and often competing political persuasions. More groups are expected to join once the programme gets off the ground.

Given the complexities of NGO politics in the Philippines, making the consortium work will be touchy. ''This is an unusual animal,'' says Marivic Raquiza of the Philippine Rural Reconstruction Movement (PRRM).

''You have four different clusters of organisations within the present membership,'' says Patricia Ma. Araneta, NIPA secretary- treasurer.

This unwieldy NGO structure is supposed to work within a complicated national system where NGO and government officials are supposed to work together in different bodies from the national to the ground level.

Aside from having to deal with politicians and bureaucrats from the local and the national levels, NIPA will have to win over the communities of upland peoples in the identified protected areas.

But NIPA officials remain optimistic. Says Araneta: ''We have to make this work. We have no choice.'' (END/IPS/RI/LNH/94)


[c] 1994, InterPress Third World News Agency (IPS) All rights reserved

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