Empowerment Through Services

On 23 February 2010, YBUL entered a contract with SERASI program, funded by USAID/Indonesia, on a project called “Strengthening Community Development Initiatives in Bener Meriah”, Aceh Tengah.  The primary objective of the project is: community-led, environmentally sensitive livelihoods and vocational opportunities in Bener Meriah.  Together with selected local community members, YBUL will implement three main activities:

1. Community convention which is aimed at obtaining consensus among communities on important problems and strategic ways to resolve the problems;
2. Establishment of a community learning center (CLC) in Simpang Layang village on the side of Bireun – Takengon main road.; and
3. Development of community-based projects on agriculture, fishery and livestock (small ruminants).

YBUL selected 7 villages of two kecamatans (Pintu Rime Gayo and Timang Gajah) to work with:   Blang Rakal (fishery), Rimba Raya (agriculture – melon), Muara Pakat (agriculture - chilli and fishery), Sukadamai (goat), Pantan Pendiangan (chilli), Cekal (chilli), and Blok C (goat).  There about 10 beneficiaries in each village.  These projects will become community-based demonstration plots and the beneficiaries will act as cadres as well as trainers for other community members in their villages.

A community convention will be held in early May, to serve as the foundation in the future project implementation.  Important stakeholders as well as decision makers will be invited in the convention to agreed upon strategic issues on these three sectors: agriculture, fishery and livestock.  The convention will also build commitments of these stakeholders in joint efforts to overcome these problems.  Possibilities of other similar programs will be explored for potential collaborations.  The convention will also become a forum for obtaining recognition from the local government, as well as assurance that the program is supporting achievements of the regional development plans.

YBUL establishes a Community Learning Center (CLC) in Simpang Layang village that will work with relevant line ministries and complement existing public services to assist local business and improve livelihoods. The Bener Meriah district government is poised to sign a binding MoU once YBUL demonstrates that it can secure funding for the initial start-up activities. The CLC will be staffed by skilled individuals (CLC Facilitators) who will provide information and trainings on a wide range of topics valuable to the local productive sectors. Facilitators will also play key community outreach roles in order to garner support from local public and private interests. CLC will cover three important sectors in livelihood development: organic agriculture systems, fishery and livestock development.  These livelihood and vocational activities, for examples: building appropriate pens for goats which will be integrated with organic fertilizer processing; improving pool design for fishery to expand possibilities in marketing fish under different ages to obtain more profit margins; improving livestock health through introduction of various techniques (synchronized mating seasons, feed block making, food planting techniques, etc); improving coffee planting through introduction of organic farming systems; etc.

The CLC will be managed by YBUL staff in close coordination with CLC Facilitators. It is envisioned that over the course of the project, CLC Facilitators will receive appropriate finance, management and other trainings to adequately prepare them for self-reliance upon SERASI-funded program close-out. YBUL believes that with a robust commitment by local government as embodied in the forthcoming MoU, the CLC will be more likely to sustain itself.

Indeed Bupati is very supportive to the idea of CLC and its wide functions.  However, CLC is conceptually a community owned entity, and is not meant to become one of Government bodies/units.  Along the project implementation, if Government is interested in providing some locations for some of CLC activities, these would be very much acceptable and appreciated.  CLC will have one “headquarter” that serves as the management unit.  As many functions as possible (e.g. sharing, training, seeds production, consultancies, etc.) will be held in this place.  However, as described earlier, demonstration plots do not have to be concentrated in the similar place.  These demo sites could be unutilized community owned pieces of land anywhere within the kabupaten, which will be used for CLC purposes under shared systems to co-benefit between the CLC and land owners.  A simple house owned by local community in Simpang Layang is rent for the headquarter with relatively sufficient lands for small demonstration plots and seed production.

The CLC provides support and training to local communities in the above mentioned 7 villages to design and implement development projects which is financed by the CLC (with SERASI funds). These community projects will be selected based on their merit and in line with the RPJM. Sustainability and replicability will be two important selection criterion.  Sectors to be financed include: organic farming systems in agriculture, fishery and livestock.  Guidelines on appropriate technology developed under the previous IOM supported SCACP program will be used as referrence for knowledge and skills consistency.

Contact person in CLC: Dwibroto Agung Basuki (Field Coordinator), Ph. 085277998075