Programs

Majority of the communities in Khyber PakhtunKhwa attribute their problems to lack of livelihood opportunities. The main sources of livelihoods of the communities are agriculture and livestock especially among womenfolk. People lack skills in natural resource management, agriculture and small enterprises. They also lack access to required investment to start and manage small scale enterprises through manipulating natural resources and enterprises at community level and are unable to earn enough living. It has resulted in poverty that affects their capacity to address issues relate to health, education, economic development and human rights discrimination. The earthquake of 2005 and flash flood of 2010 further exacerbated the state of natural environment and resources in the majority districts of Khyber PakhtunKhwa by damaging irrigation channels, water harvesting and conservation methods at the village level.

Objective

Increased family income among poor families in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa through diversified agriculture practices and livestock production.

Implementation Strategy

To reduce poverty PHKN will address income generation issues of the marginalized communities in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, through mass awareness raising and income generation programs in Natural Resource Management, Small Enterprise Development and Micro Credit Services Programs. Rural communities involved in agriculture and livestock farming will be facilitated by PHKN to develop strong linkages with local and provincial agriculture and forest departments through establishment of Community Based Organizations (CBOs) to access technical support to increase and diversify crop and livestock production. Special emphasis will be made to ensure participation of women folks in development interventions through provision of credit services to establish small enterprises so that they improve household economy.

According to the Government of Khyber PakhtunKhwa, around 59% of the province’s rural population has access to relatively clean water, whereas access to hygienically safe sanitation is claimed to be around 30%. However, many experts believe that the actual figures are more modest. Majority of the rural areas in Khyber PakhtunKhwa districts have no access to clean and safe drinking water. The communities mostly use unprotected dug wells at the household level. The communities complain about poor water quality (in terms of taste) and insufficient quantity of water presently available to them. Only few families use pour flush latrines with septic tanks in their homes. Due to non-availability of latrine facilities, the male members are compelled to practice open defecation, whereas females and children use existing household premises for open defecation. Personal and environmental hygiene conditions in the areas are found in poor shape. Most of the people have very few means to take care of their personal and environmental hygiene because they use unprotected water for drinking. Communities do not have adequate knowledge about health and hygiene issues and complain about stomach and skin diseases.

Objective

Improved water supply, sanitation and hygiene promotion services for poor families in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa

Implementation Strategy

PHKN will work with local communities, CBOs, NGOs and TMA (Town Municipal Authority) to improve quality and coverage of safe drinking water and sanitation with special focus on WatSan needs of the women and school sanitation for girls. Likewise emphasis will be made to improve understanding of linkages between hygiene and health through community education campaigns, especially for women and children. PHKN will also facilitate local communities to improve water storage, filtration, and drainage systems, technical assistance needed for repair, maintenance, water management and prevention of water sources. Likewise, communities will be provided awareness on latrine construction, hygiene and sanitation, and environmental sanitation.

Lack of awareness about hygiene and sanitation practices, and preventable diseases in the target areas have resulted in spread of hepatitis A, scabies, diarrhea, malaria, and cholera. Communities are unable to manage these health problems due to lack of knowledge about the causes of these diseases and access to appropriate health services. There is also scarcity of health care professionals, such as TBAs (Traditional Birth Attendants), LHVs (Lady Health Visitors), LHWs (Lady Health Workers), Doctors and nurses in the rural areas to deal with health problems related to women health and maternal and child mortality issues. There is great need to increase focus on programs such as mother and child health (MCH), and to prevent spread of communicable diseases like scabies, diarrhea, malaria, cholera and hepatitis A. Since many males from these areas work in Middle East countries as laborers therefore few cases related to hepatitis B, C and HIV/AIDS have been reported.

Objective

Poor communities in Khyber PakhtunKhwa enjoy better health and ability to cope with communicable diseases

Implementation Strategy

PHKN will address health issues through awareness raising programs on MCH (Mother and Child Health) and preventive health through seminars, focus group discussions, and establishment of linkages and referral systems with local government health services of BHU (Basic Health Unit), DHQ (KP-Districts Headquarter Hospitals), LHV (Lady Health Visitors) and LHW (Lady Health Workers) programs. Where Government health services are not available PHKN will provide TBAs (Traditional Birth Attendants) training to women activist to improve prenatal and postnatal services for pregnant women. Similarly awareness on communicable diseases (Hepatitis A, B & C, TB and HIV) will be provided to improve community practices towards preventive health. These interventions will be made successful through an innovative concept of developing village health service (VHS). This service will be owned and managed by the community through village health committee who will collect monthly membership fee from villagers to arrange periodic visits of qualified doctors to attend patients on, and provide medicines. In addition to this community funds will be used to arrange emergency transportation for patients of serious illness and emergency health services.

Khyber PakhtunKhwa has quite a number of small CBOs, and NGOs active in the rural areas for last three decades to help poor communities. Due to lack of skills and capacity to manage development projects effectively and professionally they cannot raise required financial resources for long term development in these areas. As a result they have not been able to sustain their organizations and projects. There is greater need to build institutional capacity of these small CBOs and NGOs and their staff so that they access resource available under local government development programs and from INGOs.

Objective

Improved capacity of NGOs, CSOs, LSOs and CBOs to comply with minimum standards to meet organizational and donor requirements

Implementation Strategy

PHKN will facilitate trainings on institutional capacity building needs of the communities, CBOs, and NGOs in the areas of human resource management/development, program quality and financial management. The package will include a range of trainings for CBOs, LSOs, CSOs and NGOs staff to enhance their abilities to meet their organizational and funding partners’ requirements. Likewise where feasible on the job training will be provided to staff of PHKN and CBOs in program and financial management.

Access to educational facilities in the rural areas is limited in Khyber PakhtunKhwa. There are very few public and private sector schools in the settled villages and the cities. Moreover it is difficult for children of many poor communities to access education from these schools because they do not have adequate means of transportation while living in difficult hilly areas. Girls in particular have to discontinue education after primary level education because their parents cannot afford to send their daughter to high schools near urban areas due to security reason. Likewise lack of public transport in the hilly terrains coupled with excessive expenditure on transport fares forces parents with low economic status to keep their children out of schools.

Objective

Increased literacy rate among adults, females and school going children

Implementation Strategy

PHKN plan is to link community mobilization process with the education program. Information from the target areas will be gathered through baseline survey to highlight community needs for education. In addition to this there will be regular community sensitization sessions organized on the important of education through seminars, walks, events and CBOs meetings. The sensitization will not limit itself to just awareness about the need of education but it will also inform community about the available existing educational services in the or close to their areas. PHKN will build its staff capacity to implement non-formal education program for communities lacking schools or teachers, families unwilling to send their children to schools or with adults interested in improving their literacy levels. The focus of such interventions will be on females in particular. However male beneficiaries will not be ignored. Linkages with public sector education departments will be increased to ensure enrollment of graduates of NFE in regular school system.

Women contribute a lot in diversified livelihoods activities but they are often not allowed or encouraged to participate in decision making processes and to manage financial resources. The relegation of females to only being implementers and restricting their initiative taking abilities, not only limit their productivity in the family but in the community as a whole. Violence against women is observed especially in the rural areas of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Unless women are provided equal opportunities in education and other development interventions such as health, livelihoods, water and sanitation it is difficult to further the agenda of sustainable development in this area.

Objective

Improved political and socio-economic status of women in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa

Implementation Strategy

PHKN will ensure that women folks are mobilized and have capacity to play their rightful role in community development. Women empowerment program will be integrated into the main strategic program areas to lobby and advocate for increased women participation in community decision making process and various development interventions. Keeping in view the cultural and religious sensitivities, PHKN will involve important stakeholders (religious leaders, political leaders, public representatives, and media to promote role of women in development of their areas and communities. This will be made possible through community awareness sessions, seminars, training workshops and organization of local events on health, hygiene, sanitation and livelihoods program interventions.

PHKN’s community development interventions in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa districts are compromised due to frequent disasters such as floods, landslides, heavy snowfalls, and devastating earthquakes. As a result of these disasters they lose livelihoods sources which are based on agriculture, livestock and poultry. Likewise it also affects infrastructure, irrigation, drinking water and sanitation systems. Despite occurrence of frequent disasters in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, communities have no knowledge about disaster preparedness and mitigation. There have been no concrete efforts made to build capacity of communities to manage effects of disasters. The rescue, relief and rehabilitation operations are the only efforts made by public and private sector during and after disaster. The importance of these efforts can never be under-estimated but there is a great need to consider capacity building needs of the local communities to mitigate impacts of the future disasters to prevent loss of precious human lives, livestock, and family and community assets. These losses can be averted if sound preparedness and efforts for disaster mitigation are taken. PHKN believes that disaster management is a cross cutting area and it should be in-built in all development projects undertaken by local the local CBOs and NGOs working in this area. Climate has always a key role in societal activities and development. Climate variability has both positive and negative impacts at all levels, but especially on rural communities whose livelihood are rooted in climate sensitive sectors. Climate change mostly depends directly on forestation. A great pressure is exerted on forests, terraced fields and range lands for fire wood cutting, resulting degradation of land and environment pollution. Indoor air pollution has been a major problem in rural areas of the Khyber PakhtunKhwa, besides emitting greenhouse gases thus resulting global warming. 80% of the areas lack gas facilities and there is no alternate source of cooking energy.

Objective

Improved PHKN and CBOs’ staff capacity to manage humanitarian response more efficiently and effectively

Implementation Strategy

To cope with disasters and natural calamities in Khyber PakhtunKhwa, PHKN has planned to organize awareness programs on the need of volunteers’ disaster management program at the village level for rescue and disaster response. These volunteers will also contribute in disaster mitigation interventions and will sensitize vulnerable communities about the volunteer disaster management program. This strategy will help communities to prepare themselves to deal with future disaster situations more efficiently and effectively for rescue and relief operations. PHKN will provide needed skills to the CBOs members to assist volunteers in disaster preparedness interventions.