Strengthening links between social protection and disaster risk management for adaptive social protection in Nepal

A key challenge in Nepal is the intersection of predictable chronic or seasonal poverty andvulnerability, with rapid-onset and acute shocks. Nepal in the last few decades has epitomized the'perfect storm' in which a number of different factors—disasters, conflict, political uncertainty, and challenges to economic growth—coincide with deleterious effects on people's well-being anddevelopment progress. While social protection (SP) is playing an increasing role in tackling chronic and seasonal poverty and wider vulnerability and exclusion, recent disasters in Nepal, particularly in 2015, highlight how making SP more flexible and adaptive could allow a more effective and efficient development and humanitarian response. The World Bank in Nepal contracted the Centre for International Development and Training at the University of Wolverhampton, United Kingdom, and the Nepal Institute for Social and Environmental Research, to carry out the technical assistance (TA) project 'Review of policies, systems and programs in social protection and shock response for adaptive social protection in Nepal'. The overall objective of the work is to make recommendations on possible policy, programmatic, and institutional measures for more adaptive social protection (ASP). The analysis was delivered using a mixed-methods approach. An analysis of existing data (including the Household Risk and Vulnerability Survey [HRVS] data) was used to understand the scope and coverage of existing programs and their links to disasters and shocks. A desk review of literature explored legislation and policies, program documentation and official implementation guidelines, and evaluations and research. Interviews took place with key informants at the national, district, and local government levels as did focus group discussions (FGDs) and individual interviews, especially with recipients of SP programs, at the ward or village level in the districts of Bardiya, Humla, Saptari, and Sindhupalchok.World Bank - P16351

Living at work:migrant worker dormitories in Malaysia

The COVID-19 pandemic in Malaysia drew attention to the extremely poor living conditions of the country’s approximately 2.5 million migrants from South and Southeast Asia working in manufacturing, construction, services, and agriculture. International media reports throughout 2020 and 2021 highlighted the overcrowded, unsanitary, and unsafe accommodations provided by employers, including cramped hostels, stacked containers, and rented apartments. This article addresses how migrant worker accommodation in Malaysia is utilised by the state and by employers as a spatial mechanism of control to regulate migrant labour. This case study draws on over a hundred in-depth interviews with Nepali migrant workers, recruitment agents, employers, and policy officials in Malaysia. We detail how the Malaysian government’s requirement for migrants to live in employer-provided housing forms part of intensified immigration controls implemented by the federal government. This policy effectively transforms employers into ‘landlords’, bringing migrants’ ‘private space’ under their control, thereby enabling employers’ increased surveillance of their activities. We found that employers utilised the opportunity to discipline their workforces and intensify work regimes. We therefore argue that housing has become a double-layered regulatory tool to deepen labour control among migrant populations, perpetuate a state of temporariness, and reinforce visible boundaries between citizens and non-citizens. In the process, migrants’ living quarters (spaces of social reproduction) have been subsumed into the organisation of production, serving the demands of the low-wage, highly-controlled, political economy of Malaysia

Country report : innovations for terrace farmers in Nepal and testing of private sector scaling up using sustainable agriculture kits (SAKs) and stall-based franchises

This work was carried out with the aid of a grant from Canada’s International Development Research Centre (IDRC), and with financial support from the Government of Canada, provided through Global Affairs Canada (GAC).Sustainable Agriculture Kits (SAK) Nepal was designed to test agricultural innovations for farmers in the mid-hills of Nepal and disseminate those found successful. This detailed report forms part of a contribution analysis of the Canadian International Food Security Research Fund (CIFSRF) towards scaling up innovative approaches. High rates of male out-migration in the region means that women do much of the farming in addition to domestic work. Hence innovations were largely adapted for women farmers. For instance, power tillers allow women to grow crops independent of the need for oxen and a ploughman. The report reviews project activities, outputs and outcomes

Intersectionality as a framework for understanding adolescent vulnerabilities in low and middle income countries: Expanding our commitment to leave no one behind

Given increasing policy attention to the consequences of youth marginalisation for development processes, engaging with the experiences of socially marginalised adolescents in low- and middle-income countries (including those who are out of school, refugees, married, with disabilities or adolescent parents) is a pressing priority. To understand how these disadvantages—and adolescents’ abilities to respond to them—intersect to shape opportunities and outcomes, this Special Issue draws on the Gender and Adolescence: Global Evidence conceptual framework which accounts for gender roles and norms, family, community and political economy contexts in shaping adolescents’ capabilities. Implicitly critiquing a focus within youth studies on individual agency, the articles advance our understanding of how adolescents’ marginalisation is shaped by their experiences, social identities and the contexts in which they are growing up. An analytical framework foregrounding intersectionality and collective capabilities offers a means to politicise these findings and challenge uncritical academic celebration of individual agency as the means to address structural problems

Enfranchising IDP's in Nepal

Nepal is emerging from conflict and discussing the timetable for elections. Maoist rebels have laid down their arms and joined a coalition government. But will the elections have any credibility if large numbers of displaced people are unable to vote? Can Nepal learn from experience elsewhere

El derecho a voto de los desplazados internos en Nepal

Nepal está saliendo de un conflicto y debatiendo el calendario electoral. Los rebeldes maoístas han depuesto las armas y se han unido a la coalición gubernamental. Pero, ¿tendrán las elecciones algún tipo de credibilidad si un gran número de desplazados no puede votar? ¿Qué puede aprender Nepal de las experiencias en otros lugares?

Social and Territorial Impacts of Armed Conflict Induced Displacement and Livelihoods of IDPs in Nepal

It is estimated that the Maoist conflict has created 250,000 Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) in Nepal. The livelihood questions of these IDPs are crucial to the state. However, knowledge on the livelihoods of these IDPs has mostly been derived from short term studies undertaken by national and international actors. These studies are moreover guided by a mandate to suggest solution to what they see as a problem. These studies see IDPs as static groups, vulnerable and fully in need of support and assistance. Thus, they ignore the human agencies of the IDPs as actors, their livelihoods strategies and livelihood practices. So, the research was carried out with an objective of analyzing the dynamics of the IDPs? livelihoods in the urban areas. This study takes the IDPs as actors and the urban areas as social field. It looks at the livelihood of the IDPs by analyzing their practice in the urban areas and looking at both the individual (micro) as well as the structural (macro) factors that affect their livelihood practices. These issues were examined in three urban areas of Nepal- Kathmandu valley, Banke and Dang using standard qualitative methods of data collection and analysis. A total of 270 IDPs and 100 host community members and 50 people from different national and international organizations and experts who were related to the issue of the IDPs were interviewed. The conceptual framework derived its perspective from macro-micro integration perspective of sociological theories. The framework has adapted concepts from "Structuration Theory" (Giddens, 1984) and "Theory of Practice" (Bourdieu, 1977) and livelihoods frameworks- all of whom have used macro-micro integration perspective in looking at a social phenomenon. Besides this, the study has analyzed migration theories from the macro-micro perspective and examined it in the internal displacement case. The study finds that the present understanding of the IDPs as a poor incapacitated mass is very narrow. Based on its findings, the study had divided the IDPs into 3 categories. The categories are based on capital base and, their socio-economic and political status in the host area. Based on the category they belonged to, the needs and concerns of the IDPs were different. Among them, only the IDPs in the third category are the most vulnerable in terms of their capital base and socio-economic space. Associations in political and other organizations were found to be an important asset for gaining access to different socio-economic space. Regarding integration in the host community, my study found out that except when segregated in camps, IDPs have no significant problems of integration only because they are an IDP. However, when they were segregated from the host community as when they were living in camps or in informal settlements in the urban areas, the host community did not have a very good perception towards. Except in such situations, the host communities were neither hostile nor benevolent in their practice towards the IDPs. Regarding the experience of displaced women, their most different experience was that most women did not want to go return to the villages permanently. Education and health facility for their children was the most important attraction for them in the host areas. Though women who were living in the urban areas without their family were vulnerable, they felt that urban areas had opened more space to them for positive outcomes. This was also in case of women who lived with their family. However, such agency of women in the host area was concentrated in the micro level in the household and their community but could not extend to more macro-level. Regarding policies and practice of support to the IDPs, the study found that the situation of Nepal has posed a question to the existing international definition of IDPs. The state has concentrated its effort on returning the IDPs to their villages of origin. The study found that for the IDP in all the three categories, return was the least desirable option at the present. Apart from this, the support was found to be ad hoc with a vision of short-term relief. It was implemented as ritual practice and overwhelmed by international methods. Significant local ways of looking at the problem and coping with it were ignored. This closed doors for positive outcomes

Making migration safer [updated]

In a globalising market, labour migration in low-skilled sectors plays an important role. A growing number of poor people move between their villages of origin, capital cities, and international destinations, while financially sustaining their families and home countries. The positive role of remittances for alleviating the poverty of sending countries is widely acknowledged. However, migration also leads to a growing imbalance between rural and urban areas and certain unfavourable societal changes. Drawing on case studies in Central and South Asia, this issue of evidence for policy examines the challenges of making migration safer and more beneficial for low-skilled workers

Making migration safer

In a globalising market, labour migration in low-skilled sectors plays an important role. A growing number of poor people move between their villages of origin, capital cities, and international destinations, while financially sustaining their families and home countries. The positive role of remittances for alleviating the poverty of sending countries is widely acknowledged. However, migration also leads to a growing imbalance between rural and urban areas and certain unfavourable societal changes. Drawing on case studies in Central and South Asia, this issue of evidence for policy examines the challenges of making migration safer and more beneficial for low-skilled workers

Impact of congenital heart disease on outcomes among pediatric patients hospitalized for influenza infection.

BackgroundYoung children and those with chronic medical conditions are at risk for complications of influenza including cardiopulmonary compromise. Here we aim to examine risks of mortality, clinical complications in children with congenital heart disease (CHD) hospitalized for influenza.MethodsWe analyzed data from in-hospital pediatric patients from 2003, 2006, 2009, 2012 and 2016 using the nationally representative Kids Inpatient Database (KID). We included children 1 year and older and used weighted data to compare the incidence of in-hospital mortality and rates of complications such as respiratory failure, acute kidney injury, need for mechanical ventilation, arrhythmias and myocarditis.ResultsData from the KID estimated 125,470 children who were admitted with a diagnosis of influenza infection. Out of those, 2174(1.73%) patients had discharge diagnosis of CHD. Children with CHD who required hospitalization for influenza had higher in-hospital mortality (2.0% vs 0.5%), with an adjusted OR (aOR) of 2.8 (95% CI: 1.7-4.5). Additionally, acute respiratory failure and acute kidney failure were more likely among patients with CHD, with aOR of 1.8 (95% CI: 1.5-2.2) and aOR of 2.2 (95% CI: 1.5-3.1), respectively. Similarly, the rate of mechanical ventilatory support was higher in patients with CHD compared to those without, 14.1% vs 5.6%, aOR of 1.9 (95% CI: 1.6-2.3). Median length of hospital stay in children with CHD was longer than those without CHD [4 (IQR: 2-8) days vs. 2 (IQR: 2-4) days]. Outcomes were similar between those with severe vs non-severe CHD.ConclusionsChildren with CHD who require hospital admission for influenza are at significantly increased risk for in-hospital mortality, morbidities, emphasizing the need to reinforce preventative measures (e.g. vaccination, personal hygiene) in this particularly vulnerable population