A ripple in development? - Channel Research

nisms by the more permanent NGOs (as seen in Chapter 4 on social
fabric), and because of the reinstatement of the state as the primary
interlocutor.
Chiming with the present study, the previous evaluations remarked
on the limited understanding amongst aid agencies of what was required
for sustainable livelihoods. There was all too often confusion between
asset replacement and rebuilding the fishing industry. The aid community,
it concluded, had not assumed a strategic stance regarding how to
add value and fill gaps between these two processes. This remains the
same finding in the present evaluation.
The evaluation expressed a fear that as a consequence of this lack
of understanding, some rehabilitation efforts may prove ultimately ineffective
and unsustainable, undermining development, for example by
encouraging over-fishing. This has not been noticed by the present evaluation,
and has probably not happened, which confirms the finding in
the original 2006 Sri Lanka study that the markets were adjusting themselves.
The evaluations stated that LRRD requires attention on how to
align programming with national planning and capacities. It noted that
although there were signs that this was happening, there was poaching
of staff, and inattention to policy frameworks. The issue has now divided
into two, with the national development policies much more taken into
account through aid harmonisation processes (with all the complexities
that this is throwing up in each of the three capitals), while on the other
hand local capacity is still woefully undervalued.
Most agencies had shown ignorance of the historical trends in the
two countries 103 , and of how aid programming could avoid repeating
mistakes, and had to make difficult trade-offs between speed and quality
of response and in deciding where people should be encouraged to live.
An unfortunate outcome of this had been a lack of attention to issues of
risk reduction. This has now clearly been overcome, although very
slowly.
The evaluations concluded that there was a tendency “to worry
more about how an activity would appear ‘back home’ (ie where donors
are) than its relevance for affected populations”. There was a consequent
need for LRRD to improve by breaking out from the project
perspective, engaging with the local and national development processes,
and not allocating responsibilities to agencies that cannot muster
the skills and strengths to undertake a sizable recovery engagement.
This coincides with our own finding that there is a need for a new kind
of actor, which is not much in evidence in the three countries studied,
that can undertake rapid area recovery programmes without falling into
the pitfalls of NGO implementation.
103
In LRRD1 only Indonesia and Sri Lanka were included.
110