HIV/AIDS Prevention in Western Yunnan, PRC

HIV/AIDS Prevention in Western Yunnan, PRC

MDG

6 HIV/AIDS

ADB Review [ May - June 2004 ]

A novel approach of combining prevention programs and infrastructure projects is having impact

By Eric Van Zant
Consultant Writer

Large infrastructure projects, particularly major road construction, can contribute substantially to the spread of HIV/AIDS. They can also create an opportunity to spread knowledge about prevention of the disease. For that reason, ADB has begun to include prevention programs alongside its infrastructure projects. In a unique move, ADB is implementing an HIV/AIDS prevention plan to accompany the ADB-financed Western Yunnan Roads Development Project in the People’s Republic of China (PRC).

REPERCUSSION Major roads can contribute to HIV/AIDS spread

For the first time such a method was tried in the PRC. “I would strongly recommend that this be developed for any infrastructure project,” says Jean-Marie Lacombe, Head, Portfolio Management, Indonesia Resident Mission, in charge of the roads project. The expressway under construction will improve transport between Kunming and Ruili, a town on the Myanmar border and at the epicenter of the HIV epidemic in the PRC.

Anywhere between 15,000 and 20,000 workers will be employed each day during construction, which is due for completion around 2007. Typically young, the workers are usually without their families and are often enticed by the sex services offered around the projects. This leaves workers, the women drawn to the sites to work as prostitutes, and spouses at home, vulnerable to HIV/AIDS.

Yet it also offers a chance to educate people who would normally be difficult to reach, says Mr. Lacombe. Through the program, the workers will learn and share the knowledge with people they meet.

The expressway project will upgrade about 300 kilometers of local access roads in some of the poorest areas of Yunnan.

Financed from the Poverty Reduction Cooperation Fund (PRF) of the United Kingdom’s Department for International Development, the program will raise awareness on HIV/ AIDS. It will promote safe-sex practices and use of condoms, and ensure HIV/AIDS prevention services are offered at contractors’ work sites. It will also enhance the HIV/AIDS monitoring system, including the surveillance of the epidemic in the region.

In the past, dealing with problems like HIV/AIDS associated with major projects would have been dealt with through a provision in the contract with civil works contractors, says Mr. Lacombe. Designing and implementing a program concurrently is expected to be more effective.

Mr. Lacombe says the experience, which involved concerted efforts to gain agreement from various PRC government departments, which at first were not interested, can be applied in other countries.

Including disease prevention in the design of large projects is in keeping with ADB’s strategy for reducing poverty and with the Millennium Development Goals.

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