Not a dictatorship

The (pro-government) New Times drew my attention to this recent story of Bonaventure Bizumuremyi. The following is taken from United Press International:

The UMUCO newspaper may be suspended for a year ... In a lengthy article in the current issue [the managing editor] Mr. Bizumuremyi wrote that like the Nazi leader - who was first held in great regard - only to be revered years later, President Kagame was also having his last days as the darling of the west. ... However, according to Prosecution, Mr. Bizumuremyi has no case to answer because the Ethics Committee is yet to hand them the dossier.

The paper has been suspended, despite no charges being pressed by the ethics committee? And this is even the official goverment position.

The article goes on:

Meanwhile, Mr. Bizumuremyi has not been seem since Monday raising speculation that he may be in detention, neither did he attend the Committee summon. His phone is also off and staff at the newspaper says they have not heard from him for days.

Compare that to the Amnesty International Report of 2007 which also mentions Mr Bizumuremyi:

Bonaventure Bizumuremyi, the news editor of Umuco, reportedly had his home in Kigali ransacked in January by four men armed with clubs and knives. Before this attack, Umuco had criticized the ruling party for ineptitude and for allegedly controlling the judiciary.

Development tourism revisited

My short cynical post on "Development Tourism" seems to have stimulated some discussion on other blogs, most notably in a post of a certain Chris Blattman. In particular though, I like the follow-up post in response to the discussion in which Chris says...

"Several people pointed out, rightly I think, that Westerners who spend even two weeks on a development project can give back, just not right away. Later it life, these people may give more time, thought, and money to important causes and decisions as a result. That is excellent, and important.

In that case, however, perhaps we should call these trips what they are: thoughtful and caring, but experiential, not charitable.

I think what makes me uncomfortable is the tendency (for some) to frame or advertise short visits and contributions as a way to give back, or (worse still) to 'save' someone else. ... Saving, I would argue, is an impossible and ultimately harmful aim."

My sentiments entirely. Nicely put.

Word of the Day: donor-dumping

donor-dumping (n.) - This is when a donor or development agency introduces products below the market price in competition with local businesses. Due to their financial resources, donors are able to out-compete local businesses and force them out of the market. Examples of products that are commonly “donor-dumped” on developing markets are: EU/US clothes donations, EU/US food aid, policy consultancy services, financial services and UNIDO infrastructure projects. Donor-dumping is widespread amongst all development aid organisations. In simpler, grass-roots development initiatives, donor-dumping tends to be directly visible in the form of goods or services sold at dumping prices. In more complex development projects, such as grants for infrastructure, donor-dumping can only be seen in the indirect effect on the price of services delivered by the subsidised infrastructure.

Donor-dumping not only leads to competition with local businesses. In cases where subsidies go to social infrastructure such as health centres and hospitals, donor-dumping can also lead to unfair competition with state-run infrastructure. In a heavily donor-funded state, this leads to a parallel state-system run by donor/NGO funding and management structures.

Almost all donor-funded projects have activities which can be classified as donor-dumping. This is a result or poor project design and the Mittelabflussproblem (the use of cash disbursement as the main success indicator for development projects).

Under control

A couple of weeks ago, the side rear view mirrors on both sides of my car were stolen. My car was parked in the centre of town just outside the Kigali city administration and opposite the restaurant of a friend of mine.

Rwanda has an extremely low crime rate, especially in the built-up areas. This is basically because in a small police state with a high population density, it is easy to completely control and know most things that happen. Occasionally though, someone will get away with a minor theft. But that doesn’t mean that the crime wasn’t noticed…

So how does one handle the rear view mirror situation in Kigali? Well first, I ask the owner of the restaurant to ask his cooks whether they can’t buy the mirrors straight back from the thieves at a discount. Normally, this would work, as everyone knows everyone. After a few days however, it seems that the thief was not a friend of the locals. A little surprised I try my second option: I phone the car garage. They ask me where and when my mirrors were stolen. Two days later, they magically have my mirrors waiting for me at the garage. I buy them back at 25 dollars a piece.

I some strange way, everything seems to be under control here, and even petty crime has a clear system.

Of course, a controlled and ordered state is not necessarily a stable one. That is an entirely different debate.

Word of the Day: development tourist

Development tourist (n.) – An intern or short-term employee on a contract of up to 1 year, who wants to “experience the developing world” and “help out”, and who will afterwards leave the country, leave Africa and/or even leave development aid work altogether. By some estimates, development tourists make up over one third of the white population of Rwanda.

Word of the Day: Donorbabble

Donorbabble (n.) - Language used by organisations working for or with the donor industry to make their work look clever. A typical example of donorbabble would be: “We will organise a multi-sectoral working group to plan the development of a sector-wide capacity building master plan.” In standard English this roughly means that a big group of people will talk about planning a plan to train people in everything. Donorbabble is used by the donor industry itself, by development consultants and also by poor country governments who "speak the language of the donors".

Sustainable Development for dummies (Part 3 – The way forward)

This is the third of 3 blog posts in which I try to explain very briefly my view of what “Sustainable Development” is, based on my experiences in Rwanda.

In my last post, I concluded:

Development Aid is sustainable when it leaves behind an independent and exponentially growing sector, that continues to grow and respond to future environmental, social and economic challenges.

So how do we create such independent exponential growth? Experience in creating sectors in Europe and Africa have shown that to “jump-start” a sector from the outside, you need to work through 3 development stages:


To illustrate this development, you could look at the development of the German solar energy market from the 1990s up until now. This market started with a small demonstration programme called “100 roofs”, then it the government introduced an even larger “1000 roofs” programme and finally the government introduced a law guaranteeing a fixed price for solar electricity to private and public operators. The solar electricity market took off and is now one of the largest solar energy markets in the world.

This model shows a logical progression, in which each stage prepares for the next one: Pilot projects in phase 1 test technologies and methods that could be used in a larger national programme in phase 2; Larger national programmes in phase 2 sensitise the population and create independent organisations, institutions and companies for phase 3. Finally, the independent sector development on a national level in phase 3 can create the exponential growth required for sustainable development.

A poorly designed development aid project would be one that counter-acts this development. For example, if a country has a growing private textiles industry (phase 3) and a donor brings in free clothes to distribute to the poor (phase 1), then this will damage or even destroy the local clothes and textiles businesses.

Sustainable development is hard to achieve. It is unclear whether such a complicated issue is within the abilities of a large, bureaucratic, inflexible and uncoordinated donor industry. Time will tell: If in the next 50 years we achieve as little development in Africa as we have in the last 50, we will once again have failed.

Sustainable Development for dummies (Part 2 – Market Cycles)

This is the second of 3 blog posts in which I try to explain very briefly my view of what “Sustainable Development” is, based on my experiences in Rwanda.

Whether it is the government, aid agencies or NGOs attempting to develop a country, the final aim is the same: to give an impulse to the development of independent sectors. Energy specialists try to create entire energy sectors, health specialists attempt to create a national health sector, economic development specialists try to create a whole range of vital economic sectors. The development of a new sector generally follows the following 4-stage profile (adapted from a product life cycle):

I. Sector introduction stage

• demand has to be created
• cost high
• volume low
• no/little competition

II. Growth stage

• economies of scale
• volume increases significantly
• public awareness
• competition begins to increase

III. Mature stage

• market is better established
• volume peaks
• increase in competitive offerings
• prices tend to drop
• differentiation, diversification of product or service.

IV. Decline, Stability or new growth stage

• volume stabilises leading to a focus on efficiency rather than growth
• volume declines e.g. if a replacement product/service is introduced
• new growth stage can be triggered if changes in the market or the product create new demand

Development aid simply doesn’t have the resources or the mandate to guide the entire product cycle. For example, how can development aid hope to supply electricity to hundreds of millions of people in Africa?

The aim of development aid is to guide a sector through stage I so that the market and the government can take over an exponentially growing sector.

This is a key point in understanding the role of development aid. Understanding this principle, also allows us to better assess the sustainability of a development aid intervention. If indeed we are successfully guiding a sector through stage I of its development, we would expect to see:

• Exponential growth
• The creation of new independent market actors and institutions

Our new definition of sustainable development aid would then be:

Development Aid is sustainable when it leaves behind an independent and exponentially growing sector that is able to respond to future environmental, social and economic challenges.

This is an ambitious aim. And I would guess that less then 10% of development aid projects succeed in fulfilling this aim. Leaving behind a sector independent enough to continue the work after the end of your project is not easy.

Sustainable Development for dummies (Part 1 – Dynamic societies)

,This is the first of 3 blog posts in which I will try to explain very briefly my view of what “Sustainable Development” is, based on my experiences in Rwanda.

The buzzword of the decade is “Sustainable Development”: development that is environmentally socially and economically sustainable. The days of environmental exploitation, rollercoaster-capitalism and social exclusion need to end if we are to survive. We need to protect the environment, manage our economies better and help the poor.

What does sustainability mean for development aid projects? The answer of many of my colleagues in development would be something like this:

Development Aid is sustainable when the results achieved remain indefinitely, without destroying the environment, becoming unprofitable or causing social problems.

Sounds reasonable. If for example, we train 10 fishermen to fish better, those 10 fishermen continue to fish better after the training project has ended. Ideally, the fishermen pass on the better fishing methods to their children. And also, to ensure that their lake is not over-fished, they create a cooperative to manage fishing rights.

Unfortunately, things are not that simple in reality. The sustainability of the project will be threatened by three types of challenges:

• Maintenance: people will need to be retrained, cooperatives need to be revitalised and new fishing equipment needs to be maintained. An intelligently planned project can generally reduce this problem.
• Changes in the market: If the regional fish price collapses, if fishes migrate or people start eating less fish, the fishermen will have to respond to the changed situation. For many, this will mean finding a new occupation. Whilst the project might teach people to fish better, it doesn’t necessarily teach people how to look for vocational training by themselves.
• Population and demand growth: As the population and the economy grows, so will the needs of the people. People will need to further improve the efficiency of their fishing methods. But people will also need to find other occupations and create new industries. Basically, we don’t need to train fishermen, but micro-businessmen who will fish whilst it is profitable, and who will constantly look for new and better opportunities.
  

Basically, the problem is one of a constantly changing, dynamic and independent society. People will only succeed if they don’t need help from the outside to respond to such developments. There needs to be constant innovation, improvements, entrepreneurship and development for any improvement to be sustainable.

Our re-definition of sustainability could look something like this:

Development aid is sustainable when it leaves behind an independently functioning society and economy is able to develop and respond to future environmental, social and economic challenges.

Pouring concrete

A visit to one of our micro-hydro plant building sites. On days like this I love my job. These are project profit-driven private sector companies with restricted support from us. They are employing dozens of locals, developing spin-off businesses, will provide cheap electricity and are already looking for the next possible power plants. This is sustainable development. No community-owned plant with financial management issues, buraucracy and misguided ideas about the public good.