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Quetta, the Provincial headquarters of Balochistan province, has experienced rapid growth in recent decades. Local demographic increase owing to fertility rates has been augmented by  internal and international migration. Jobs in the provincial administration and ancillary employment have attracted people to Quetta. It has also been a sanctuary for Afghan war refugees. Owing to rapid growth, an increasing proportion of Quetta’s population resides in unplanned settlement (Katchi Abadies). Despite substantial international financial and technical assistance to Quetta since 1981, the Government has lacked the management capacity to sub-divide and lay out plots, let alone plan the growth of the city and provide essential services such as piped water supply, sanitation, and solid waste management beyond a few enclaves.

Most katchi abadies in Quetta have grown organically along natural features or the boundaries of agricultural fields. The irregular layouts make the provision of service difficult. In many low-income areas, communities have got together to successfully lobby for local development, for example, water supply from a departmental tubewell. Arrangements for collective payment of electricity charges for tubewell water are also common. However, with the convenience of piped water, its use per capita and the volumes of effluent generated have also increased. At present, much of the black and grey water is drained through open streets, posing severe health hazards for such areas. People and their communities will increasingly have to become their own planners and providers, letting Government concentrate on the provision of trunk infrastructure. The Quetta Katchi Abadies Environmental management Program (QKAEMP) is designed to facilitate the process of  local development and environmental management.

Katchi abadies house the bulk of the poor of Quetta.  First generation women migrants are particularly oppressed in the city owing to strict purdah and the absence of secluded spaces for defecation. Excreta dumped into open drains or mixed with solid waste enters the water supply and air, or is carried in-doors by unwashed hands and feet, exposing an already disease ridden population to more pathogens. The Program has contributed to institutionalize a model of partner ships between local government, local areas committees, and lane organizations for environmental management, and to results in better health and economic conditions for the residents of low-income areas.

The QKAEM program is based on social mobilization  for self-help in environmental management, entailing a full-blown capacity building effort addressing the concerned unit of Quetta Municipal Corporation (QMC), provincial level NGOs, their partner community-based organizations (CBOs), and lane  organizations (LOs) of beneficiaries.

•  Preparing communications material: Awareness raising - door to door campaigns, lane film shows
• Social mobilization - local area workshops, walk-a-cause, and so on Participatory surveys and planning - making area and lane maps
• Skill and capacity development - training of staff  and partners Formation of Mohalla committees - male and female
• Providing technical support for laying drains, sewers, and for installing Pour Flush Latrines, PFLs.  Joint oversight of construction, and
• Lateral and vertical promotion of project experience for scaling up.

 

Expected Results

By 2002, a successful project will improve environmental conditions in around 50-60 neighborhoods or sub districts within the Katchi Abadies of Quetta.

The project envisages that by 2002 these sub- CBOs and LOs in these areas will be well established, characterized by democratic rules of operation and financial solvency including self-confidence and self-respect among the communities. Such institutional development will result in higher prevalence of good hygiene practices, in safer disposal of excreta and sullage water, in effective solid waste management, and more forestation on public spaces in unplanned settlements.

By 2002, all the target lanes will have their own organizations and own savings, all target lanes will have functioning sewers and access to filth depots. At least 85 per cent of age 5-plus children will regularly wash hands with soap after defecation, and around 60% of the saplings planted in the public spaces in Katchi Abadies will have survived. These selected indicators of the success of the Program may be supplemented by other similar measures.