Community Livelihoods And Civil Society Organisations In - UNDP

expertise passed from generation to generation include skills such as making bags, canoes,
building houses and buildings, hunting and traditional medicines. NGOs noted that despite
the importance of these skills and knowledge, outsiders and townsfolk in particular often
assume the villagers know nothing; they even refer to them as stupid (‘bodoh’). Their expert
knowledge of the environment and its sustainable, effective and efficient use over centuries
are not acknowledged, however this is an important human asset upon which to build.
Similarly, although the village populations do not have trade certificates, they usually
possess certain skills related to construction, cooking, music and so forth, and in some
villages there are people with skills in basic electronics or mechanics, driving, and
accounting, apart from the people who are trained (formally or informally) as midwives,
church workers and teachers.
2.1.5 Financial capital
The main source of financial capital in villages far from towns is external assistance,
comprising village development funds and OTSUS funds. As noted in relation to natural
capital, there is income potential in the natural resource base, however in most cases this is
not being exploited, or is exploited but not with significant benefit to the community. Apart
from having extremely limited incomes and savings, in most cases community access to
credit or loans is limited and not well understood. Banks and credit agencies are not used,
partially due to the long distance between villages and towns where they exist, but also
because most people in the villages far from towns consider banks and such institutions as
places for people with a lot of money. They have never considered using formal financial
institutions.
At the same time however, many of the communities have a long tradition of saving, as
gathering and relaying bride wealth (‘mas kawin’) has high cultural importance. Bride wealth
can be collected in many forms, including money, but essentially requires concerted effort to
gather and save over time, as well as requiring complex accounting of contributions, debts
and repayments. Many communities also have habits of saving for feasts, festivals and also
for church activites, including for example their savings and other resources mobilised for
the construction of the church.
The lack of guidance for village communities
to see these parallels, and to recognise the
meaning and benefits of saving are primarily
why financial resources are not well
managed. Other important reasons include
the lack of ownership and understanding
about the purpose of external assistance, and
the lack of any technical assistance and
guidance that is offered to communities when
‘government funds’ (including OTSUS) are
distributed. Some villages are not able to
differentiate between sources of funding, if
their village receives it, and the money from
government coffers that does arrive is often
divided amongst households and thus perceived simply as income. In many villages, such
‘assistance’ is taken for granted and in most villages it has not been used for any collective
purpose but rather is creating a form of dependency.
10