Communities
In Papua New Guinea, the 80% of the population that lives in rural areas owes their sustenance, their culture, and their potential for the future to their environment. The pristine condition of much of Papua New Guinea and its biologically diverse abundance obscure the fact that human development indicators for many of the people living in here are some of the worst in the world.
The collapse of government services gives rise to tremendous vulnerability, in particular to the rural communities. How should this vulnerability be addressed? Development options such as large scale logging, mining or fishing have largely failed Papua New Guineans due to pandemic corruption, lack of capacity of government agencies and lack of understanding (or equal amounts of naivety and greed?) within the communities affected. There have undoubtedly been some positive macro-economic effects from these development initiatives, (i.e. currency stability, current account balance), however human development indicators have been falling steadily for the last decade while fish stocks, forestry and mining reserves are being rapidly and unsustainably depleted.
A widely supported alternative in PNG is to assist the ability of communities to utilise their own natural resources (over which they are constitutionally given title) for improved subsistence and economic opportunities. This work has been ongoing for the best part of the 90's. However, now these initiatives are generally looking beyond single sector options such as eco-tourism or small-scale logging. This in part could be considered a response to the complexity and viability of these economic initiatives. Certainly, it can also be attributed to the limited value of even successful single-sector initiatives when there is no education, health care or security. In response, options are being balanced with broader community based basic service provision and economic opportunities.
CUSO PNG is collaborating with the following organisations:
Village Development Trust
Research & Conservation Foundation of PNG
Conservation Melanesia
World Wildlife Fund
East Sepik Local Environment Foundation
Damon Gesengen Guest Village
Ohu Butterfly Farm and Conservation Area
CUSO is supporting this work both programmatically (strategies to meet these challenges) and organisationally (organisational capacity) by:
An extensive number of agencies and individuals exist in the country that available to support community-based work. Being aware of these resources, establishing contact with these organisations and promoting collaboration multiplies the impact of individual efforts. Recent examples include:
Madang Provincial Community Based Organisations - we are currently assisting a broad number of local organisations to access funding, contact other development agencies, or to focus their own activities.
Whether facilitating or running the workshop or training, CUSO's experience and expertise can be shared to develop more meaningful partnerships.
Efforts in PNG are often made in isolation yet they remain on they sit on the cutting edge of work in their field. Disseminating these efforts to other organisations here in the country helps to develop a deeper pool of experience and understanding of what Papua New Guineans can do to assist their women and children. As well, supplementing this work with the experience from outside the country can infuse new ideas and reinforce the quality of the work being done through PNG's own solutions.
Communities and NGO's - We are opening a discussion amongst our partner organisations to examine how each one of us is working with our constituent communities, why, and towards what end. Through this dialogue we hope to identify Best Practices or at least to disseminate each other's experiences.
Communities, NGO's and District Government - Another aspect of
Sometimes, work around issues of community-based natural resource management highlight the need for expertise not readily available in Papua New Guinea. Often these skills are required across several organisations. CUSO can recruit qualified people from Canada. These people make available their experience for periods ranging from six months to two years or more. Increasingly, CUSO is able to multiply the benefit of having these skills in the country by making them more widely available through collaborations with other agencies such as the German Development Service, the Community Development Scheme and World Wildlife Fund.
There are no Current Placements within the Community Managed Natural Resources programme.