CREATING JOBS IN CONFLIC TAFFEC TED AREAS
• Confl ict and postconfl ict areas are characterized by mobile populations. Workfare programs, along with a traditional resettlement campaign, can help ease the transition of internally displaced people to their places of origin by providing them with temporary employment and guaranteed income for a period of time. Implementing a public work program in conflict and postconflict situations poses certain challenges, however: • Security is a major concern. In most cases, workfare programs can proceed only when there is sufficient order to provide a secure work environment and transportation to work sites, especially for women. Land mines and other conflict-induced hazards must be removed before a workfare program can begin. • Most workfare programs use the wage rate as a targeting device, setting it at a level that is high enough to induce people to participate in the program and low enough to attract only the very poor. In confl ict-affected areas, setting an appro-
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priate wage can be difficult if private labor markets have not functioned for some time. In such situations, practitioners must be creative. In Sierra Leone, for example, preconflict household survey data, along with monthly price data on staple foods and fi sh, were used to come up with a wage estimate. • Some communities may be so destroyed that the scope of public works may be broader than usual. In such communities, it could be desirable to include the rebuilding of private homes as part of the workfare program, as was done in Sri Lanka. • Excombatants may not be able to work with other members of society, given the animosities generated during the confl ict. Fearing reprisals, many excombatants in Sierra Leone did not wish to return to their villages, where a workfare program had been established. The solution was to allow such people to work in the workfare program set up in the capital. Sri Lanka’s public works program overcame some of these problems (box 7.8).
BOX 7.8 Implementing public works in a postconflict environment: Sri Lanka’s Northern Province Emergency Recovery Project The decades-long conflict between the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the Sri Lanka government ended in May 2009. The conflict had led to the destruction of social and economic infrastructure and the displacement of hundreds of thousands of people from the five northern districts of Jaffna, Kilinochchi, Mannar, Mullaitivu, and Vavuniya. As part of its resettlement plan, the government established a cash-for-work program to repair community infrastructure and provide returning internally displaced populations with short-term income support. Community leaders and project officers of the five districts identifi ed projects. Community members mobilized returning households to form community cash-for-work committees, which identified projects of immediate need for the communities.
Projects included debris removal and land clearance, well restoration and construction, small-scale irrigation canal rehabilitation, small road rehabilitation and repairs, classroom rehabilitation, health clinic repairs and rehabilitation, and repair and construction of community drinking water facilities. A maximum of three adults (including the head of household) from each returning household were eligible to participate in the program, with only one member allowed to participate on a given day. This feature of the program was included to encourage participants to seek other work. In order to encourage only the very poor to selfselect into the program, the wage rate was set at 15 percent below the market rate for unskilled labor for the district. The market wage was established by a (continues next page)