Lao PDR Hydro Project Improves Families' Standard of Living, Health
IN THE green, rolling hills of Lao PDR’s Nakai Plateau, one of the world’s most monitored development projects continues to move forward. The Nam Theun 2 hydropower project, which ADB is supporting with US$120 million in loans and guarantees, will ultimately generate 1,070 megawatts of electricity when commercial operations commence in December 2009. Most of the power will be exported for sale to Thailand, generating $1.9 billion in revenue for the Lao PDR during the first 25 years of the project. The funds will be used to improve health, education, and other social services nationwide.
The Nam Theun 2 reservoir will cover an area of 450 square kilometers, and as a result, 1,216 families in the Nakai Plateau are currently in the process of relocating their homes. Comprehensive livelihood and resettlement programs have been put in place to help ensure that families and communities are not adversely affected by the project. The project is also supporting the preservation of 4,000 square kilometers of forest as a permanently protected wilderness reserve – an area about six times the size of Singapore. The reserve will provide a permanent habitat for elephants and other wildlife.
To date, 761 households have moved into new tropical hardwood homes, and the remaining 455 households will have relocated by June 2008. Each new house is equipped with electricity, sanitary facilities, and clean water access. Every relocated village has a school – a first for these communities – and villagers are receiving free monthly health checkups from qualified medical providers. In a country where 80% of the population resides in rural areas with minimal access to basic social services, and where only one in five villages have access to electricity, the relocated families are experiencing a significant improvement in their standard of living.
While the Nam Theun 2 project remains a work in progress, certain positive trends are beginning to emerge. Children who have already moved to new villages are significantly healthier, due partly to the fact that families have year-round access to clean drinking water for the first time.
“Incidents of anemia have gone down, incidents of malaria have gone down, and child and maternal health has improved,” says ADB Senior Social Development and Resettlement Specialist Marla Huddleston. “A direct correlation has already been found, even in the short period of time in which some families have lived in their new communities.”
“Things have gotten much better,” says 27-year-old mother Pheng, of Nong Boua Village. “We have better [living] conditions than before. We have a health center here now - we didn’t have any health center before.”
“Today we have everything,” she adds. “In the past we only had a very simple house, and now we have a beautiful one. We still have to think about the future and work hard for our daily needs, but we’ll never have to worry about where we’re living.”
In addition to a new home, the 1,216 affected families in the Nakai Plateau are receiving a 0.66 hectare plot of land for farming, an additional 3 hectares of permanent agricultural land, and will be allocated 5 hectares of pasture land for livestock. The introduction of new livelihood programs for affected families is proving to be one of the more challenging components of the project. Ms. Huddleston says that while livelihood programs such as agro-ecological (organic) farming, fishing, and animal husbandry are progressively taking root, much work remains to be done to ensure that these ventures are sustainable.
“A challenge for the project is how to gradually build up ownership and the responsibility of families to take over the operation and maintenance of every component of the livelihood programs,” says Ms. Huddleston.
During the time families are making the transition to their new working life, the project agreement contractually obligates the Nam Theun Power Company (NTPC) to provide every affected family with a standard of living that places them above the poverty line – and better off than the majority of their countrymen living in rural areas. Until families can meet that threshold by themselves, NTPC is obligated to provide families with food and income subsidies.
In addition to contending with a new ways of earning a living, some families are experiencing understandable anxiety over moving into new homes and villages.
Nakhai Neua Village elder Mr. Sayavong, who has lived in his home for decades, says the move will involve many difficulties for him and his family. “When we move to our new homes, we’ll have to start all over again, and work very hard,” he says.
There are other challenges that have confronted the resettlement effort as well. Unexploded ordnance from past conflicts still litters the Nakai Plateau countryside. 4,500 hectares of land had been cleared to date, with over 15,000 pieces of explosive ordnance removed.
Extending the Social Safety Net
While the families of the Nakai Plateau have been most directly affected by the Nam Theun 2 project, families living in 31 villages in the wilderness reserve, some 70,000 people living in downstream areas, and about 1,000 households that that have lost land due to dam construction also have needs that need to be addressed. Accordingly, the NTPC is committed to provide $16 million to offset livelihood losses caused by a loss in fish catch for downstream communities, $31 million to protect wildlife habitats and support livelihood activities for the 5,800 people living in watershed areas, as well as compensation and livelihood programs for other families negatively affected by construction activities.
Ultimately, the degree to which the Nam Theun 2 project will benefit the Lao PDR’s people hinges on the extent to which project proceeds are judiciously used to address the fundamental needs of the Lao PDR’s poorest families. To help ensure that the $1.9 billion in revenue will contribute to a better standard of living for the Lao PDR’s people, ADB and its partners are providing support for fiscal reform and improved revenue management in the country.
While much work remains to be done for the Nam Theun 2 project to make good on all of its obligations to affected families and communities, few families want to return to the lives they led before the project started.
“In the old days our family grew rice, slashing and burning before planting. We usually only got enough rice to last us three months each year,” says Ms. Bouan of Kyeng Ngao Village, noting that the people of her village had to forage for food in the forest for the remaining nine months of each year – a grueling daily pursuit.
“We didn’t have enough rice to eat, but in this new village we have enough food, and the project has provided us with a piece of land for a home garden. Here is [also] better, because we have water, electricity, and this beautiful home.”
Top of page
