IOM promoting income generation for quake reconstruction

Under a blue sky in the grounds of the Ajaz Gillani Relief Tent Village, in Muzaffarabad, capital of Pakistani-administered Kashmir, a group of women wearing heavy-duty workmen’s gloves are grappling with thick coils of metal wire. The women, survivors of the October earthquake that killed over 80,000 people, are learning to make gabions – steel mesh structures used to strengthen buildings and bridges when filled with rocks or concrete. In front of them, a squatting man demonstrates how it is done, deftly weaving the metal strands together at a thunderous pace. “It’s difficult at first because the wires are tough,” says 35-year-old Parviz Abdulleyman, who lives on the camp in a tent with her five children. “But I want to learn how to do it to make money,” she says. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) has launched a scheme to teach vulnerable women living in spontaneous camps to make gabions for cash. The IOM will provide the raw material and will then buy the gabions, which will in turn be used in Muzaffarabad and surrounding areas to fortify walls, bridges and river banks and to protect against landslides. Many thousands of gabions will be needed as reconstruction of infrastructure in the quake zone gets under way with improving weather in northern Pakistan. Teams of five workers can make up to 25 gabions a day and the IOM will buy back a gabion measuring 3 x 2 x 1 metre for US $3. The IOM has an agreement to provide the municipality with the many gabions needed to repair or replace bridges, roads, walls and buildings that were lost in the quake. “We’re getting women involved, especially vulnerable women who have been widowed from this disaster,” said Shawn Pomeroy, logistics coordinator for the IOM. Pomeroy added that the gabion project can be extended to families with no income, or families who were in rented accommodation and have no homes to return to. The Ajaz Gillani Relief Tent Village is a spontaneous camp that arose when a local landowner, Ajaz Gillani, gave fleeing villagers permission to settle on his land. Gillani lost several family members in the quake, including his wife. Spontaneous camps with under 50 tents receive less support from humanitarian aid agencies than camps established by the agencies themselves, and the IOM have identified and assessed 70 such camps. The tent village is in better condition than many other spontaneous camps in Muzaffarabad, but four months after the earthquake there is no sewage system in place and the cramped tents are worn and dirty. Pools of murky, stagnant water have collected around the camp and barefoot children wear ragged, filthy clothes. “Camps under 50 tents are the most neglected to date. They are continuing to appear and as they’re not registered they have received little aid,” says Pomeroy. A major issue facing rural earthquake survivors who fled to nearby towns for aid is the prospect of returning to their villages. The government has set a deadline of 31 March, but many survivors say this is too soon and they feel under pressure. The IOM says their project will give villagers an incentive to return. “One of the main reasons they are reluctant to go back is that they don’t have an income. This project has started to address this,” says Pomeroy. Zarka Aliaskar is also learning to make gabions. Like many of the survivors living at the camp, Zarka is not from the city but from one of the villages perched high on the hills above Muzaffarabad. “My biggest problem is living in the camp. I want to go back to my village, but there’s no land left and so no way to earn a living. Now I can try this,” she says. Zarka says that the project is also enabling women to learn skills. “It’s important for women to learn how to do this as it will be a business for us. We have to carry on with our lives, stand on our own two feet and not depend on anybody.”