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Creating
wage opportunities is an important agenda that is naturally
associated with watershed development projects. From the
very beginning, the wage related issues are discussed and
analyzed. Directly or indirectly several wage related issues
are dealt within the project. This process is tracked here.
It is very unfortunate see that several initial efforts such
as identification of wage/ migration problem, vulnerable
groups as a result of lack of wage opportunities, did not
yield the results to the wage seekers in watershed villages.
The problem is identified in 75% of sample villages. But the
labor groups are formed only 37% of the villages. Exclusive
wage opportunities are given to labor groups only 25% of
villages. Even the wage opportunities are snatched from the
wage seekers by employing machines in 37% of villages, while
the contractorship is a most common practice in 80% of
villages. As a result of this chain of processes, the real
wage opportunities did not reach the wage seekers, which
could have reached them. Innocent wage seekers are generally
happy with what ever they got in the name of watershed
works. They did not even object to the wage deductions in
the name of contributions for the watershed development
fund. Deduction from wages is a common practice in 80% of
watersheds. Putting all these processes together, the wage
seeker is an ultimate loser in the livelihoods projects. It
is important to change these processes to ensure that
watershed projects yield livelihood outcomes to poor. |
