Third Party Quality Monitoring and Capacity Building in Small Community-based Infrastructure Development (Phase I)

Completed Projects

WFP in Nepal has been working extensively in supporting community owned small rural infrastructures like rural roads, school buildings, foot trails and bridges, irrigation canals, small water supply systems and other community buildings through their food/cash for assets project. These projects provide labor for wage in the form of food, cash or a combination of both items while engaging populations particularly affected by high food prices, food deficiency or natural disasters and conflict.

Key activities

SW Nepal was assigned to assess the technical, environmental and social standards in WFP supported infrastructure projects under its PRRO 10676.0 programme. The firms role was to assist in strengthening the capacity of implementing partners so as to enable them to apply the agreed quality and safeguard parameters. The activities included assessment of constraints, creating awareness and capacity building and action for non-compliance

Services provided by SW Nepal

In the Phase I assignment, SW Nepal reviewed WFP policies and the documents developed by implementing partners and agencies engaged by WFP on their policies, frameworks and guidelines to develop a set of standards. Based on these, a set of indicators were prepared covering agreed quality standards for a range of infrastructures developed in more than 30 districts across remote and inaccessible areas of mid and far western districts.

A team of field monitors comprising engineering, social and environmental team regularly visited the sites and worked with the Cooperating Partner (CP) teams, which often are national and local NGOs working together with local communities in remote areas where supervision is challenging and priorities are to get the work done as soon as possible to provide food support quickly to the populations.

Output

The assignment also focused on improving the capacity of the implementing partners to ensure that the infrastructures developed met the technical, social and environmental standards appropriate for the areas and agreed standards.