UN program helps development at the grassroot level

Eleven years ago today, the United Nations General Assembly established Dec. 5 as International Volunteer Day. The day was set to celebrate humankind's noblest spirit of volunteerism and the efforts volunteers around the world have made to improve the lives of others, from the palm-laced villages of Bali to the concrete streets of New York City. To mark the occasion, Gedsiri Suhartono of The Jakarta Post wrote three articles, one of which focuses on her trip to Lombok, West Nusa Tenggara, sponsored by the United Nations Development Program (UNDP).

JAKARTA (JP): The United Nations Volunteers (UNV) program, the volunteer-sending arm of the world body, was established in 1970 to serve as an operational partner in international development at the request of any UN member.

Administered under the auspices of the UNDP, the UNV supplies professional people to support governments, non-governmental and community-focused development works.

The UNV serves a wide variety of needs but primarily focuses on humanitarian relief and rehabilitation, peace building, human rights and electoral operations of the UN, promotion of private and public enterprises and transfer of knowledge through expatriate nationals.

Since 1971, 12,350 UN volunteers from some 140 nations have worked in an equal number of countries.

There are two types of assignments available for volunteers: two-year humanitarian relief assignments and UN International Short-Term Advisory Resources (Unistar) postings, which are demand-driven and flexible in terms of time.

The UNDP in Indonesia is made up of the regular UNV program and a Domestic Development Services (DDS) program.

The UNV's work in Indonesia dates back to May 1973, when the first two volunteers, a welding instructor and radio repair instructor, were assigned to a UNDP/International Labor Organization project dubbed the "Industrial Vocational Training Scheme" in Irian Jaya.

Since then, about 56 UNV specialists and 150 UNV/DDS field workers have worked in Indonesia. Reciprocally, 112 Indonesian volunteers have served in various Asian countries.

In the future, Indonesians are expected to enter, if not dominate, the number of volunteers serving in Indonesia.

"A similar scenario is being implemented in other countries, each wanting to prioritize utilizing local resources," said Dianne D. Arboleda, a UNV program officer.

Arboleda pointed out that in the Philippines, her home country, there are only two international volunteers serving.

Some sneer at the prospect of having local volunteers due to the fact that volunteerism is not valued highly in Indonesia, at least not professionally.

"When I first came here, people thought that I was doing volunteer work because I could not find employment in my own country," said Thelma C. Orbase, a former volunteer who currently works as a corporate accountant.

In the Philippines, prospective volunteers are recruited professionally. They have to undergo several tests to prove their ability to endure strenuous working conditions and challenges such as psychological, communication and capability tests.

"Very few people understand that we do the sort of job that we are doing because we wanted to for personal reasons," said Gemma Relojo, another volunteer from the Philippines.

Indonesia has hosted the largest number of UN volunteers in Asia, but few of them are from Indonesia.

Samiran Hadi Subroto, a Mataram-based volunteer coordinator, said so few Indonesians are willing to become volunteers that he became the center of attention when he arrived in Nepal to perform his first duty in 1983.

The UNV/DDS activities are geared to strengthen volunteer- based organizations, encouraging them to share expertise and help relevant government agencies reach out to villages.

So far, the volunteers have created 425 small self-help groups that initiate activities such as safe drinking water infrastructure, sanitation facilities, vocational and appropriate technology training, primary health care promotion, child nutrition and maternal care programs, village cooperative support, income generation activities, urban slum renewal and environment programs.

Concentration on gender issues, according to Arboleda, will soon be one of the main focuses for recruitment. Programs will deal with the disadvantages and subordination issues that women have had to endure.

Seven UNV specialists are currently assigned either to UNDP- funded projects, other UN agencies or to non-governmental organizations in Irian Jaya, Maluku, East Nusa Tenggara, West Kalimantan, West Java, Central Java and Jakarta.

These three-year projects, which end in January 1997, are jointly financed by the UNDP and the Indonesian government.

The focal point of the UNV/DDS Program in Indonesia is the Ministry of Manpower, which coordinates the program together with the Cabinet Secretariat and the Ministry of Home Affairs.

The project provides the service of 17 UNV/DDS field workers and 178 co-workers that implement village-level projects.

The project's core strategy is to strengthen "grassroots" institutions such as the Institute for Village Community Resilience, the Family Welfare Movement and the Karang Taruna youth organization. The project also aims to establish participatory development models in 30 less-developed villages in five eastern provinces of Irian Jaya, Maluku, Southeast Sulawesi as well as West and East Nusa Tenggara.

During this process, the project tries to increase the community's access to government services and funding from international NGOs, bilateral and multilateral agencies.

The Japanese embassy recently granted the Akar-akar village in Lombok Rp 15 million (US$ 6,300) to build a clean water piping system.

Several bilateral donor organizations, including the embassies of Canada, Australia, Germany, New Zealand and the US-based Trickle Up Program have also funded the UNV program.