Indigenous Peoples Safeguards Monitoring Report

Project No. 40534-013 Annual Report December 2014

2649-BAN (SF): Second Crop Diversification Project

Prepared by Department Of Agricultural Extension for the Asian Development Bank.

This social monitoring report is a document of the borrower. The views expressed herein do not necessarily represent those of ADB's Board of Directors, Management, or staff, and may be preliminary in nature. In preparing any country program or strategy, financing any project, or by making any designation of or reference to a particular territory or geographic area in this document, the Asian Development Bank does not intend to make any judgments as to the legal or other status of any territory or area.

iii

L 2649 BAN (SF)- Second Crop Diversification Project

Semi-annual Monitoring Report

Department Of Agricultural Extension

Middle Building (6th Floor), Khamarbari

Farmgate, Dhaka-1215

December 2014

Indigenous Peoples Safeguards

iv

Contents 1. Project Background .............................................................................................................................. 1

2. Indigenous People in Project Area ....................................................................................................... 1

3. Objectives of Study .............................................................................................................................. 2

4. Inclusion of IPs under Project Operation (Group formation) .............................................................. 2

5. Opportunities and Challenges of IP inclusion in Project activity ......................................................... 2

6. Credit accessibility ............................................................................................................................... 3

7. Accessibility in production technology ................................................................................................ 3

8. Project Intervention among IPs in GodagariUpazila ............................................................................ 3

9. Planned Demonstrations for IP Population in future .......................................................................... 5

10. Distribution of Demonstration in IP Upazila .................................................................................... 5

11. Adverse Impact of Project Intervention in Livelihoods of IPs .......................................................... 5

12. Conclusion ........................................................................................................................................ 6

13. Recommendation …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….6

Appendix 1 Baseline Analysis of Indigenous People

v

Acronym

MFI Microfinance Institute BRAC Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee OFSSI On Farm Small Scale Infrastructure HVC High Value Crop

1

Monitoring Report Activities with Indigenous People

Second Crop Diversification Project (SCDP)

1. Project Background

The project officially launched in June 2010 but field operations commenced in Feb 2012 after

recruiting of MFI/BRAC and BRAC started SFG formation in July 2012 when full swing field

activities was under operation after completing the recruitment of necessary manpower and

consultant. The project is being operated in 43 Upazilas of 18 districts of south and south-east

and 9 Upazilas of 9 districts in the northwest since June 2010 with the aim to reduce poverty

by improving farmers’ incomes. The project is fostering commercialization of agriculture

through interventions to promote diversification into high value crops (HVC) and value

addition. The prime objective of the project is to raise farm incomes, alleviate poverty and

stimulate the economy of both southwest and northwest through high value crop production

among the small and medium farm households.

2. Indigenous People in Project Area

As per baseline report 2013 of the project (page 77) total indigenous households in the

country are 3,56,175 with 15,86,141 (7,97,477 male and 7,88,664 female)population. Among

the projects’ Upazilas the indigenous people are living in Godagari of Rajshahi and Birampur

of Dinajpur district. In Godagari 7,671 households with 42,132 indigenous People (IP)1 are

living while in Birampur 2,593 households with 12,107 people2 living in the remote areas of

the Upazilas. Two types of indigenous groups Orao and Santal are found in the project area

(GodagariUpazial). Generally development initiative does not benefit the IPs equally and

particularly at times they are adversely affected and marginalized by development processes.

In some instances IPs face eviction, loss of resources for livelihoods etc. During project design

it has been clearly mentioned that the IPs should have to be treated equally as of local

population. Following the ADB’s new safeguard policy the project included the IPs as project

target population and started to form SFGs in the locality even though the area is

comparatively remote and difficult to operate credit programs. The report analyzed the

effectiveness of project interventions/activities being operated among the IPs and

investigated any adverse impact of development intervention towards the livelihoods of

indigenous populations. The details analysis of baseline data on the IP/Small Ethnic

Communities (SEC) of the project area are attached in annex 1.

1 Source: UNO Office, Godagari

2 Source: Office of the Upazila Statistics officer

2

As observed during field survey only few households of IPs are living within 5-7 km radius of

the Upazila HQ. Majority of the IP population are living in the periphery at least 30 km away

from the Upazila HQ.

3. Objectives of Study

The main purpose of the study was to measure the levels of accessibility of IP population to

the project development intervention in the area. The specific objectives are:

- To explain the opportunities and challenges of the project to improve the livelihoods

of IPs

- To highlight the development activities being promoted into the IP communities

- To quantify the project financial facilities ensured for the IPs

- To monitor the livelihood improvement of IPs due to project’s interventions

4. Inclusion of IPs under Project Operation (Group formation)

The project started formation of SFG since July 2012 and till Dec 2014, 25 indigenous groups

have been formed by the partner MFI with 361 members. Out of 25 SFGs (Indigenous People)

18 formed in Godagari Upazila and 2 in Chapai Sadar Upazilas of Rajshahi district and 5 in

Birampur Upazila of Dinajpur district. Of 25 groups 9 are male with 131 members and rest 16

female groups with 230 members. Details are shown in table 1 below.

Table 1: Number of indigenous group/member organized under the project till Dec 2014

Sl # Location

Number of group Number of member

Male Female Total Male Female Total

1 Godagari 5 13 18 75 195 270

2 Birampur 3 2 5 36 13 59

3 ChapaiSadar 1 1 2 25 25 50

All 9 16 25 131 230 361

5. Opportunities and Challenges of IP inclusion in Project activity

The IP populations in the project Upazilas are basically farmer not connected with any kind of

traditional business, which could be treated as an opportunities of the project to involve

them in improved farming business (commercial agriculture). On the other hand majority of

the IP households are leaseholders and day laborers so introduction of commercial

agriculture by producing selected vegetables could be one of the good options for them.

3

Technology (crop production) demonstrations and skill development training for the farming

people would help to improve their livelihoods.

6. Credit accessibility

The project organized a session to monitor the credit accessibility of IP communities in Nov

2014. The production credit is being operated by the BRAC was taken by few members

present in the session. The responses of the participants in respect of credit utilization are not

encouraging. Of the 200 participants only 21 (11%) participants said they have received loan

from BRAC. Out of these 21 credit recipients 17 (81%) were female and the rest 4 (19%) male.

The majority respondents informed that BRAC not yet started loan distribution in their area,

some other people showed their reluctant to loan due to ignorance or fear to repay. The

representative of BRAC present in the session informed that they have opened three new

branches in the IP areas recently to intensify production credit among the interested

members, so it is expected that the credit accessibility of IP members will increase several

folds by next three months.

7. Accessibility in production technology

The technical session identified the accessibility of participants to the production technology through demonstration and technology training. It has been observed that only 6 (3%) participants received demonstrations and 52 (34 female and 18 male) i.e. 26% attended training courses organized by DAE. The demonstrations set into the IP group members are on:

1. Improved production of tomato (one farmer) 2. Use of pheromone trap in brinjal (one farmer) 3. Improved production of summer country bean (two farmers) 4. Bulb production of improved variety of onion (one farmer) 5. Production of chili without insecticide – safe agriculture (one farmer)

8. Project Intervention among IPs in GodagariUpazila

The intensity of IPs is greater in the GodagariUpazila of Rajshahi district than the other two

Upazilas. The BME specialist visited 5 IP groups having 100 members in the Upazilas in Nov

2014 to measure the accessibility of members to project interventions.

Of the groups visited BRAC started credit activities in only 2 groups and other 3 groups yet to

be brought under SCDP credit; however the members of those 3 groups have some kinds of

credit accessibility from other organizations like Caritas and World vision. The distance (more

than 30 km) of the majority of the indigenous/adibashi group-location is mentioned by the

BRAC officials as main drawback of loan flow into groups. However, as informed BRAC

recently has opened two more branch offices in the indigenous/adibashi locality to overcome

4

the limitations of carrying money from distance places by the field staff. And expectedly the

credit mobilization into the indigenous/adibashi groups will improve soon. Details of the

groups visited are shown in table 3.

Table 3: Number of IP member in visited groups

Location # Group # Member

Male Female Total

Gopalpur 1 20 20

Bangabari 1 15 5 20

Atherpara 1 5 15 20

Gunigram 1 20 20

cowdoar 1 20 20

All 5 40 60 100

Out of 47 interviewed members till now only 16 (34%) members received credit from BRAC

and the size/amount ranged from Tk 5000/- to 15000/-. One male group received credit once

while member of one female group received credit 2-3 times. Details of credit activities are

shown in Annex 1. Maximum numbers (23%) of members utilized their credit for production

of tomato, some people used credit in producing brinjal (9%), chili 2%), potato (2%) and onion

(2%).

Table 4: Status of project intervention in five visited Indigenous group members (with 82 members)

Indicator Percent Respondent

Recipient Non-recipient

Training 53 47

Demonstration 9 91

Loan/Credit 34 66

Tomato 23

Brinjal 9

Chili 2

Potato 2

Onion 2

It has been observed that 53% members received training on vegetables (tomato, brinjal and chili) and only 9% members received demonstrations on country bean and chili. These poor farm households have shown their satisfaction to attend training organized by DAE as a) they have received Tk 300/- as allowance b) conveyance & free lunch c) production techniques for crops. They have also shown their keen interest on receiving crop demonstration as one of their fellow farmers earned Tk 20,000 from demonstration plot of summer country bean. The project has planned to organize more numbers of training on crop production and set

5

demonstrations on vegetables. Suitable households will be brought under homestead development program of the project so that their nutritional status could be improved. As most of the households are landless and dependent upon cultivating crops in leased in land there is very little scope to promote fruit orchards among the indigenous farm families.

9. Planned Demonstrations for IP Population in future i) Improved production package of country bean with modern variety (reduction

of aphid damage) ii) Summer country bean production iii) Pheromone trap in brinjal iv) Planned homestead vegetable gardening v) Mite control in Chili vi) Demo of BARI hybrid tomato (to ensure quality seed) vii) Improved production package of pointed gourd (higher net margin) viii) Production package with improved variety of onion (bulb) ix) Production package with improved variety of papaya

10. Distribution of Demonstration in IP Upazila The above identified demonstrations are planned to be distributed in Kharif I cropping seasons in three project’s upazilas where IP populations are concentrated. Table: Distribution of Demonstrations in IP area in Kharif I season 2015

Location Kharif I

Summer bean Brinjal HVG Total

Godagari 5 3 5 13

ChapaiSadar 3 3 5 11

Birampur 3 3 5 11

Total 11 9 15 35

As estimated by these demonstrations around 30 farm households will be benefited by getting extra production without cost and subsequently in following cropping season the family will get better earnings from the plot using the technology. Moreover the spillover benefit will be harvested by other nearby farm families too.

11. Adverse Impact of Project Intervention in Livelihoods of IPs

During FGD session community consultation is made with the people around (besides the

group members) to identify the negative impact of project interventions towards livelihoods

of the IP populations. The project has civil works component including construction of OFSSI

(On Farm Small Scale Infrastructure) but in Godagari there is no civil works except OFSSIs

(two). One OFSSI is planned to be constructed in Gopalpur village where there is IP

households but the site as found 1.5 to 2.0 km away from the residence of the IP

6

communities. As such there is least possibility of sound hazards or any other pollution of

construction for the IP communities. During consultation with the key informant people no

negative impact was mentioned by the communities due to the projects’ other interventions

like credit operations, crop demonstrations, technology training etc. The HVC production

under the project will also not affect any indigenous species of seasonal crop or plants, fishes

or animals. At this stage it could be concluded that so far no project activities have been

identified that can impact negatively to the livelihoods of indigenous people.

12. Conclusion The baseline survey on IP population in the project area captured the intensity of IP population in the

project area and their challenges towards livelihood improvement. The report elaborated the

opportunities of crop production into the IP communities. While there is no adverse impact of the

project on the santaal, Orao, Mardi, Kisku etc of the project areas, the projects benefit impacted the

SFGs formed by 25 SECs positively with respect to enhancing their income from agriculture and also

the living standard.

13. Recommendation It has been advised to undertake special training programs for IPs on HVC productions

based on the selected production challenges identified during the workshop in last Nov

2014. The BRAC committed to establish some more branch offices in the IP locations. The

PMU is planning to set special crop demonstration and training for IP communities that

would improve the situation further.

Annex 1

Ministry of Agriculture

Department of Agricultural Extension

Second Crop Diversification Project

(SCDP)

Baseline Analysis of Indigenous People

Submitted by

GFA Consulting Group &

HB Consultants Ltd.

14 February 2013

i

Contents 1. Objectives of Study .................................................................................................................................... 2

2. Methodology of the Study ......................................................................................................................... 2

3. Study Findings ............................................................................................................................................ 2

3.1 IP Population ...................................................................................................................................... 2

3.2 Socio-economics of IP Household ...................................................................................................... 3

3.3 Land Occupancy of IPs ....................................................................................................................... 3

3.4 Land Resources of IP Households ...................................................................................................... 3

3.5 Existing Cropping Systems ................................................................................................................. 4

4. Opportunities and Challenges of IP population in Project activity ............................................................ 5

4.1 Production Challenges ....................................................................................................................... 5

5. Recommendation ....................................................................................................................................... 5

ii

Acronym

MFI Microfinance Institute

BRAC Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee

ADB Asian Development Bank

HVC High Value Crop

DAE Department of Agricultural Extension

Annex 1

Baseline Report Indigenous People in the Project Area

Second Crop Diversification Project (SCDP)

SCDP is a follow on Project to earlier Northwest Crop Diversification Project (NCDP) implemented by DAE and supported by ADB. The SCDP is being operated in 43 upazilas of 18 districts of South and Southwest and 9 upazilas of 9 districts in the Northwest with the aim to reduce poverty by improving farmers’ incomes. The Project fostered the commercialization of agriculture through interventions to promote diversification into high-value crop (HVC) production and value addition. The Project also planned to strengthen institutional capacity of the Department of Agricultural Extension (DAE) – the lead executing agency of the Project to address the needs of IPs. Project impact, outcome and outputs are being achieved through the implementation of 5 components, (i). HVC Production Support; (ii) Value Addition Support; (iii) Credit Support; (iv) Institutional Strengthening; and (v) Project Implementation Support. As reported in the project’s administrative manual in South and Southwest, the indigenous people (IPs) are located in the remote coastal areas that not always suitable for high-value crops cultivation due to the soil and climatic condition. In some of the selected Upazilas of the Northern region Santal and Orao communities are living. Besides, some low caste Hindu professional communities like cobbler, fishermen are also part of the community. These communities are often excluded, marginalized and sometimes behave as IPs. As secondary occupation, almost all are engaged in agriculture. Women play a very important role in the field and post harvest agricultural activities. Most of these communities are landless and rely on agriculture laborer, open water fishing etc. Some people of these communities have land and they practice indigenous crop production techniques/subsistence agricultural practices with very low yields. The SCDP is to support those communities so that they can also participate to cultivate HVCs in their lands with a view to change livelihoods of these subsistence families.

As per census report 2011, total indigenous households in the country are 3,56,175 with 15,86,141 (7,97,477 male and 7,88,664 female) population. As reported by the Upazila Agricultural Offices among the projects’ Upazilas the indigenous people are living in Godagari and Chapai Sadar Upazilas of Rajshahi districts and Birampur of Dinajpur district. In Godagari 7,671 households with 42,132 indigenous People (IP), in Chapai sadar 105 households with 425 people and in Birampur 2,593 households with 12,107 people are living in the remote areas of the Upazilas. The indigenous people living in the project area are mostly belongs to Santal, Orao, Saren, Kisku, Mardi and Tudu. Generally development initiative does not benefit the IPs equally and particularly at times they are adversely affected and marginalized by development processes. In some instances IPs face eviction, loss of resources for livelihoods etc. During project design it has been clearly mentioned that the IPs should have to be treated equally as of local population. Following the ADB’s new safeguard policy the project included the IPs as project target population and started to form SFGs in the locality even though the area is comparatively remote and difficult to operate credit programs.

The study was carried out in Nov 2012 to identify the existing socio-economic conditions of the IPs in the project area. The report analyzed the family size, land size, occupation etc. of different groups of IPs.

2

1. Objectives of Study

The main purpose of the study was to measure the opportunities of IPS to participate in the project interventions and existing levels of accessibility towards development activities. The specific objectives are:

- To carry out baseline survey into the IPs in the project area - To identify the opportunities and challenges of the project to improve the livelihoods

of IPs - To quantify the existing resources base of the IPs - To measure the technical and financial support required for the IPs living in project

area

2. Methodology of the Study

The information is documented based on FGDs made in the Chapai Sadar, and Godagari Upazila of Rajshahi district and Birampur Upazila of Dinajpur district during November 2012. The investigation was made to assess the present status of the indigenous population and opportunities of group formation and to identify the prospects and limitations of their livelihood improvement. The negative impact of project intervention among the ethnic communities is also been identified through community consultation. The study was conducted following FGDs techniques and by collecting the secondary data. In Godagari 4 FGDs, in Chapai 2 FGDs and in Birampur 3 FGDs were conducted. The numbers of participants in the FGDs are shown in the following table 1. Table 1: Number of participants in FGD sessions

SL # Location # FGD participant

Male Female Total

1 Godagari 40 42 82

2 Chapai Sadar 21 22 43

3 Birampur 30 32 62

All 91 96 187

3. Study Findings

3.1 IP Population

The local DAE officials reported that in Godagari Upazila around 45,000 indigenous people are living who are mostly poor and indeed day laborers with few exceptions. In Chapai sadar some 500 people of IPs are living while in Birampur as reported 1300 IP inhabitants are still living mostly in rural areas. The following table showed the present IP population as per Upazila statistics in the project area by locations. Table 1: IP population in project area

Sl # Location # IP

Household

IP Population (#)

Male Female Total

1 Godagari 7671 21022 21110 42132

3

2 Chapai Sadar 105 210 215 425

3 Birampur 2593 6037 6070 12107

All 10369 27269 27395 54664

As observed during field survey only few households of IPs are living within 5-7 km radius of the Upazila HQ. Majority of the IP population are living in the periphery at least 30 km away from the Upazila HQ. It indicates that large numbers of IP households are living far from the MFI/BRAC office at the Upazila. As such BRAC may face difficulty to include and operate credit facilities for the IP populations. The project should carefully monitor the inclusion of IP population into the group formation and credit operation programs.

3.2 Socio-economics of IP Household The field observations made during FGD sessions revealed that the average age of the participants is 31 years with more aged participants in Godagari followed by Chapai sadar and Birampur. In case of family size of the IP households highest found in Godagari (5.04), followed by Chapai (4.78) and Birampur (4.5). Among the FGD participants better education observed in Chai followed by Birampur and Godagari. Table 3: Socio-economics of FGD Participants in project area

SL # Location Age (Yr) Family size (#) Education (class)

1 Godagari 34.04 5.04 3.74

2 Chapai Sadar 31.21 4.78 5.12

3 Birampur 28.31 4.50 4.01

All 31.2 4.8 4.30

3.3 Land Occupancy of IPs

Out of total participants who were present during the FGD sessions, 6% have no homestead land, and living in khash land but no difference (financial base) could be identified between with and without homestead families in livelihood patterns as all of them depend upon daily wage. On the other hand 94% members said they have their own homesteads. Interestingly 72% of the FGD participants said they are cultivating seasonal crops by leasing the land from absentee farm households (Table 4). Table 4: Land occupancy of the FGD participant in the project area

Indicator Percent Respondent

Yes No All

Homestead 94 6 100

Cultivated land 60 40 100

Leased in land 72 28 100

Education 62 38 100

3.4 Land Resources of IP Households Of the interviewed households 60% have own cultivated land ranged from 08 decimal to 165 decimals per family. Interestingly one household in Gopalpur village owned more than 4 acres of cultivated land. These families are mostly dependent upon production of rice (aman and boro) and vegetables

4

mainly tomato produced in leased land. The homestead area of the IP households as reported is 11.25 decimal per family. No much variation observed by locations in respect of homestead area/household. The maximum numbers of indigenous people are leaseholders and their area of cultivated land under leased in contract ranged from 97 to 145 decimals per family. Of the IPs the own cultivated land ranged from 22 decimal to 31 decimal per family. In Godagari, though land area per household has observed higher but maximum people found without own land. Table 5: Land resources of FGD participants in project area

SL # Location Land resources per households (dec)

Homestead own land lease land Total

1 Godagari 10.41 30.5 104.88 145.79

2 Chapai Sadar 11.02 27.3 88.46 126.78

3 Birampur 12.32 22.20 62.52 97.04

All 11.25 26.67 85.29 123.20

3.5 Existing Cropping Systems

Existing cropping systems being followed by the IP people was assessed by getting their responses on what type of crops are growing in their cultivated land. Some of the responses are summarized in the following table 6. The important information to be marked is that with few exceptions the IP people are landless, they do not have their own cultivated land but doing cultivation by leasing land from neighbors or absentee landlords. Except tomato (cultivation is highly commercial) mostly they are using local varieties for field crops and getting poor yield. Demonstration of improved production technologies in summer country bean, onion (either seed or bulb production), brinjal (insect control), papaya etc could be set for introducing commercial agriculture. Evan they are landless leaseholders but most of them still have own homestead, so there is scope to work on developing homestead agriculture. Table 6: Existing crops and cropping of Indigenous people in Godagari Upazila, Rajshahi Sl # Name of

participant Own land (decimal)

Lease land (decimal)

Name of crops grown at present

1 Nabohari 4 90 Tomato, mustard, aman rice, country bean, bottle gourd, sweet gourd, ash gourd

2 Khagen 2 66 Chili, brinjal, garlic, potato

3 Shudhir 33 99 Chili, garlic, ash gourd, tomato

4 Rina 15 Potato, brinjal

5 Naresh 5 132 Country bean, bottle gourd, aman rice, boro rice

6 Adory 84 Wheat, sweet gourd

7 Karuna 6 66 Tomato, rice,

8 Khokon 264 Potato, mango, papaya, lemon, guava

9 Shaloti 3 45 Tomato, banana, papaya, lemon

10 Manik 346 Wheat, lentil, banana

11 Sabitri 7.5 165 Bottle gourd, mustard, aman rice, boro rice, chili, brinjal, potato

12 Fazlul haque 165 Rice, chili, tomato, brinjal

13 Daulo 132 Aman rice, boro rice, mango

14 Sanda 66 99 Tomato, potato, bottle gourd, country bean

15 Shephali 66 Rice, tomato, brinjal, papaya

16 Renu 165 165 Aman rice, lentil, tomato, wheat, lemon, hog

5

Sl # Name of participant

Own land (decimal)

Lease land (decimal)

Name of crops grown at present

pulm, papaya

17 Pauli 66 33 Tomato, brinjal, pointed gourd, mango,

18 Parboti 50 66 Rice, wheat, country bean, papaya

19 Debu 33 231 Wheat, lentil

20 Sunil 15 Aman rice, tomato, potato, cucumber

21 Munir Hosta 5 15 Country bean, chili, tomato,

26 107

4. Opportunities and Challenges of IP population in Project activity The IP populations in Godagari, Chapai and Birampur are basically farmer not connected with any kind of traditional business, which could be treated as opportunities of the project to involve them in improved farming business (commercial agriculture). Another opportunity is that majority of the IP households are leaseholders and day laborers so introduction of commercial agriculture by producing selected vegetables could be one of the good options for them. Technology (crop production) demonstrations and skill development training for the farming people would help to improve their livelihoods. The specific production challenges identified during the study are stated below.

4.1 Production Challenges 1. Unavailability of quality (good) seeds of cultivated crops especially for tomato 2. Aphid infestation in country bean 3. Fruit borer infestations in tomato 4. Shoot and fruit borer in brinjal 5. Cutworm in potato 6. Mango defoliator attack in tender shoot of mango 7. Virus and mite attack in chilli 8. Anthracnose disease in guava 9. Anthracnose disease in tomato 10. Virus infection in tomato 11. Insect infection in garden pea 12. Nutrient (nitrogen) deficiency in pointed gourd 13. Virus infection in lentil 14. Lac of fair price of crop commodities

5. Recommendation 1. Training program to be organized into the IP members to mitigate identified production

challenges by two months time 2. Technology demonstrations to be set into the IP SFG members considering the solutions of

identified production problems being faced 3. Motivational tours to be arranged for the IP group members to make them aware on commercial

agriculture 4. Promotion of homestead vegetable gardening including fruit trees to be initiated from next

cropping season 5. Farm Yard Manure (FYM) pits are to initiated into the households of IPs 6. Linkage between IP group leaders and SAAOs to be strengthened through mobile network 7. Special campaign to be organized to plant fruit trees into the households of IP SFG members 8. Credit facility to be ensured to the IP group members 9. Collective efforts to be ensured to implement the decisions taken