Rapid Rural Community Response (RCRC) to COVID-19 in India

forwater — Mon, 26 Dec 2022 09:36:31 +0000

Rapid Rural Community Response (RCRC) to COVID-19 in India forwater Mon, 12/26/2022 - 15:06

Current

Off

Image

The unprecedented spread of the COVID-19 virus has presented a threefold crisis worldwide – public health, economic and socio-psychological; a truly population scale problem. The reverse migration triggered by the sudden announcement of the lockdown in India poses a huge challenge for the scores of migrant workers trying to get back to the safety of their homes in their native villages. While stoppage of transport services, loss of wages and abysmal social security in the urban areas is making the journey arduous, situations of grave hunger and possible ostracisation awaits them at home.

It is expected that the unprecedented nature and scale of the epidemic will have a long term and wide spread impact on livelihoods and natural resources like water. Thus, it is important to create a reliable channel of communication that allows collection, collation and analysis of factual data and information to flow that will augment the government and civil society’s efforts for targeted intervention in a proactive manner, even as the crisis unfolds across the country. This information will be critical to first understand the change on the ground and then realign the policies of government as well as strategy of funding and implementing organisations.

In this context, the consortium of 20 civil society organizations having a collective outreach of over 1.2 million families has reached out to the donor community including Arghyam for financial support as well as leveraging resources that can strengthen the consortium to be more effective in its work.

The consortium has come up with three-pronged response strategy as below:

Direct Action – support to vulnerable communities, including migrant workers, through an existing cadre of 10,000 CRPs for raising awareness, support GPs, extend reach of government programmes, organize relief (food & medicines), support health workers with PPE/ quarantine facilities etc.
Action Research – to generate usable knowledge for better understanding of the public health as well as the economic crisis both in the short and long term in rural areas. This would entail building contextual understanding in multiple geographies as well as various vulnerable communities, for designing and implementing effective coping strategies.
Support to Elected Representatives and Policy Advocacy – to complement the efforts of the democratically elected representatives from the local self-government (GPs), MLAs/ MPs as well as Niti Aayog. This is for making relief and rebuilding efforts more community based, targeted and humane. The collective advocacy is aimed to inform policy of both national and state governments as well as for funding organisations.

Outputs

Relief from the distress for rural poor community in 500 blocks (estimated population: 6,000,000 people)
Better implementation of government policy and program related to COVID-19
Documentation of the impacts of COVID and the lockdown on vulnerable population especially migrant labourers and old people
Documentation of the best practices of the communities to cope with COVID and lockdown and associated learnings
Learning related to livelihoods opportunities for migrant labourers and other rural population and ideas for new livelihoods strategy in the post pandemic situation

Focus Area

COVID-19

State

Pan - India

Outreach

6000000

Duration

Wed, 01/01/2020 - 12:00

Path Alias

/our-works/rapid-rural-community-response-rcrc-covid-19-india

Response For COVID-19 in Bhachau Block (Kutch) of Gujarat

forwater — Mon, 26 Dec 2022 09:28:52 +0000

Response For COVID-19 in Bhachau Block (Kutch) of Gujarat forwater Mon, 12/26/2022 - 14:58

Current

Off

Image

In the wake the COVID-19 Pandemic, Samerth Charitable Trust is working to provide relief and rehabilitation in the Khadir Region of Kutch, an island sharing a border with Pakistan and comprising 14 villages with semi-arid areas in the north-west corner of the island and covered by the greater rann of Kutch. The people living in these villages belong to Koli, Parkara Koli, Muslims, Ahir Koli and Bharwad communities. They are mainly involved in agricultural activities during the monsoon, or in charcoal making, cutting stones, trees, migrating to salpan for other work including agriculture, gypsum-mines, construction and small-scale industries.

The region also has no direct water supply through the Narmada PipeLine and is dependent on borewells or water supply through tankers by the government. The Govt. supply is once in two days during extreme dry seasons and is insufficient in meeting the families’ needs. Currently, people purchase water (Rs 600 for 3500 litres) through private tankers and this need is going to increase with the onset of summer.

Given the remoteness of the location, the vulnerability of the communities in the region and Samerth’s presence and co-ordination with the locals including the authorities, they have reached out to Arghyam for financial support as well as to leverage other resources that can enable them to be more effective in the relief work during the COVID-19 pandemic.

In the current project, Samerth will provide essential items that are not included in the Govt. supplies for BPL/APL families which includes a kit worth 1162/- per HH. (food items + hygiene materials – soaps) and also disseminate information on maintaining social distance and hygiene in the community.