| Author | Myo Aung |
| Call Number | AIT Thesis no.RD-02-12 |
| Subject(s) | Rural poor, Myanma
|
| Note | A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of
Master of Science |
| Publisher | Asian Institute of Technology |
| Abstract | The research studied the Poverty Alleviation Program cons1stmg of Environmental
Sustainable, Food Security and Micro-income Opportunity Project implemented by
UNDP/F AO in collaboration with the Myanmar government launched in the dry zone for
the rural poor. This project was covered three townships namely Magway, Kyaukpadaung
and Chaung U in the dry zone implemented during 1999-2001.
Main objectives of the research are to assess the performances and the effects of the
development projects to the poor households; to obtain beneficiary's perception and their
level of satisfaction on the project's performance and the effects; and to make
recommendations to strengthen the poverty alleviation program in future.
The research was conducted in the two different geographical areas of two villages of
Magway Township namely Thonepautawtaung and Patikone. The main data collection
methods were household survey for poor households, key informants interview with
project beneficiaries and key staffs of the projects, group discussions with members of
community-based groups, and field observation on soil conservation, community woodlot
and agro-forestry sites. Both quantitative and qualitative techniques were applied in data
analysis.
Research findings showed that most of poor households obtained viable benefits from the
Program, which improved their standard of living. They received a lot of assistance and
inputs from agricultural activity, more training on forestry and additional extension
services obtained from the agricultural activity. The highly positive effects to their living
were found in terms of changing in the number of days on food deficiency, accessibility to
institutional services and the increase of forest area. The high level of project performances
they perceived were from the A 1 cookstove, forestry, soil conservation and livestock
development. The poor households in both villages had a high level of satisfaction level on
the performance of projects that were highly responsive to their needs as well as the good
performance of project's staffs. Although the satisfaction level was high overall, there were
a few key problems encountered in this Program. These were the lack of capital and
inadequacy of technical knowledge received, insufficient loan for agriculture and low level
of investment in income generating activities.
Certain recommendations were suggested to improve implementation of the program to be
more effective. These consisted of loan allocation from government and private sources,
provision of more technical training and extension services by government and other donor
agencies, regular maintenance on soil conservation and community woodlot by villagers,
improvement of organizational skills of community-based groups through training,
formulation of land reform policy by the government to assist the rural poor, intervention
of the government on marketing to minimize the monopoly from local middlemen and
stabilize price for crops and livestock as well as strengthening extensive communication
and networking of government's deprutments with local institutions and NGOs in the area. |
| Year | 2002 |
| Type | Thesis |
| School | School of Environment, Resources, and Development (SERD) |
| Department | Department of Development and Sustainability (DDS) |
| Academic Program/FoS | Rural Development, Gender and Resources (RD) |
| Chairperson(s) | Pongquan, Soparth ; |
| Examination Committee(s) | Weber, Karl E., Webb, Edward L. ; |
| Scholarship Donor(s) | Katholischer Akademischer Auslaender Dienst
(KAAD)-AIT; |
| Degree | Thesis (M. Sc.) - Asian Institute of Technology, 2002 |