Project referent in Heidelberg: Davide Torri ( davide.torri@asia-europe.uni-heidelberg.de )
Project referent in Nepal: Barbara Monachesi ( apeiron@apeiron-aid.org or babi.monachesi@gmail.com )
The project will be held in Dhading District (in red in the map). Dhading is part of the Bagmati Zone, and with Dhading Besi as its district headquarters, covers an area of 1,926 square kilometres and had a population of 336,067 in 2011. Dhading is the only district of Nepal which ranges from the mountain Ganesh Himal to the Churevawar Pradesh of Terai (Chitwan). Lots of villages in Dhading cannot be reached by vehicles, making relief operations even more difficult.
The percentage of poor population in Dhading is higher than the national average and People of the targeted area of Northern Dhading (where Jharlang VDC- Village Development Committee is located) are facing various problems due to the remote geographical situation and harsh climate and have limited options for maintaining their basic livelihoods.
Before the earthquake Jharlang VDC was inhabited by 825 families and all of them lost their houses and their belongings (including livestock, crops and seeds) on 25th April 2015.
THE PROJECT IN DETAILS
Apeiron is working in Nepal since 1996 and immediately felt the need to help the victims of earthquake. Nevertheless, being aware that emergency situations create also lots of chaos (unfortunately there are plenty of examples world wide of bad managed emergency funds and overlapping intervenes) Apeiron decided to concentrate its relief intervenes in earthquake hit areas where it was working before the catastrophic event.
Therefore, as Apeiron has been working in Dhading District since many years, it instantly started coordinating with Dhading DDRC (District Disaster Relief Committee) for need assessment and relief support. The local authorities requested Apeiron to support in the construction of T.L.C. (Temporary Learning Center) for the local schools in Jharlang VDC where Apeiron has been implementing a project to help improving potatoes cultivation practices since 2013. In Jharlang all the 10 local schools have been destroyed by the earthquake and till now the lessons are conducted under tarpaulins.
The government Engineers (under the Ministry of Education – Department of Education) provided the technical drawing for the construction of semi-permanent 2-rooms T.L.C. in steel truss (annex 1).
Even if 5 months have been gone by since the earthquake, the school activities have not been resumed properly in any of the Jharang VDC schools. The students are meeting in very temporary shelters, usually under tents or simple tarpaulins.
The objective of the project is to properly build the 2 T.L.C. that are needed to help the Shree Jharlang Primary School (in ward no. 1) resuming the lessons.
Beneficiaries of the project will be 62 students that are presently enrolled in the Shree Jharlang Primary School and their families, as well as the teachers and all the school staff that can finally resume their duties. Moreover the whole community will benefit from this intervene as, if the school reopens, it will be an important step towards a “normal” life after the disaster for everyone.
The activities to be carried out to reach the above mentioned objective will be:
a) material purchase: particularly steel truss and CGI (Corrugated Galvanized Iron) sheets;
b) preparatory works: such us cutting the truss and prepare some frames etc…as, after the earthquake, there is no electricity in Jharlang so these works has to be carried out in the District Headquarter, Dhading Besi.
c) transportation: it is the more challenging part as most of the roads have been destroyed by landslides caused by the big seism. The options are: to use the UN helicopters or porters; whatever will be cheaper and faster.
d) assembly work: under the supervision of the technical overseer employed ad hoc.
The total budget requested to accomplish the intervent is 11.272,29 Euro, of which 10.000 has been donated by SAI Help Nepal initiative (basically the whole budget except for administration cost that Apeiron will support by itself)
The key factors of the project are: a) its unquestionable priority for the whole community; b) the implementation of government design and standards; c) the active partecipation of the community and d) the colloborative relationship established with the local authorities.
After the T.L.Cs will be built, they will be handed over to the government and the lessons can resume as usual, therefore there will no problem for its sustainability.
some pictures taken in Jharlang VDC after the earthquake.
some pictures from Jharlang schools being rebuilt with our help.