(Final part)
Diaspora Aid
There is little doubt that the development of Guyana over the last 20 years has been driven, in part, by the massive resource input of money, goods and skills contributed by the Guyana Diaspora. The desire of Guyanese to assist required no prompting from third parties. This support has been taking place for a very long time and has grown so substantially that it has overtaken official aid flows as an important component of domestic spending. Official aid usually goes to the government who decides how that money should be spent. Diaspora aid works differently. It goes directly to the people who need it. As a consequence, many studies agree that diaspora aid helps to reduce poverty.
Appealing and Effective
There are two characteristics of diaspora interventions that make diaspora contributions appealing and effective. One is that the interventions are usually in response to a well-defined problem. The aid can be for consumption purposes, investment purposes or community support. The need, whether from a family unit or from the community at large, usually is clearly in the form of a specific request for help and the problem is often well understood by the would-be supporters in the diaspora. Even in cases where a structure has to be erected, the beneficiaries generally know what to do. For example, they know who in the village to contact in order to help them get the work done. So, for the most part, once the resources are available, there is very little time wasted between identification of the problem and providing a solution to that problem.
A second feature of diaspora interventions is that there is efficient utilization of the resources. One contributing factor is the low bureaucratic costs that are usually associated with community-targeted projects that significantly increase the size and impact of the intervention. This is typical of education projects like after-school lessons for national examinations and remedial purposes. Even in cases where a project involves some construction and requires government approval, once the approval is given, there is very little, if any, overhead costs associated with implementing small-scale projects. There are drawbacks to these types of unstructured arrangement for solving problems, especially at the community level. Sometimes unscrupulous community leaders take control of resources designated for the community project and end up mismanaging the funds. Yet, a general observation is, once the project is executed, almost all the money for these types of intervention is devoted to the project.
Aid Delivery
The effectiveness of the diaspora-type aid delivery is similar to a trend seen among many donor organizations. The European Union, through its European Consensus on Development document, recognizes how valuable it is to work directly with community organizations or non-governmental organizations. This European policy development instrument has been used for several years now to decentralize aid flows from the EU to beneficiaries. The aim of this approach was to avoid delays in project implementation and to ensure that those for whom the aid was intended did benefit. As recently as this year, Guyanese saw this policy measure in action with the EU’s Call for Proposals to strengthen the capacity of vulnerable communities in Guyana. The use of the direct aid delivery method was also demonstrated by the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) last year in which civil society and non-governmental organizations, and not government, were invited to apply for funds to implement a poverty reduction programme. The similarity of the method to that of diaspora aid delivery is that the money goes directly to the intended destination without having to pass through the hands of third parties.
Website
It is against a background of existing and prospective interventions usually targeted at the family, a designated community or aimed at meeting a specific purpose by individuals or groups that the Government is seeking to engage the diaspora. The Government of Guyana is being guided in this project by the International Organization for Migration (IOM) of which it became a full member in December 2011. It was an observer member of the organization for about six years prior to that. In addition to setting up a Diaspora Desk in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to engage the Guyana Diaspora, the Government launched a website, www.guydproject.iom.int, on September 26, 2012 in collaboration with the IOM to gather information about the Guyana Diaspora. These are early days, but very little useful information is available on the website. There is expectation that over time more concrete details of the diaspora project would emerge. However, conversations with persons familiar with the project suggest that an underlying motive of the engagement is to encourage members of the diaspora to switch from a loose system of support to a more coordinated one that had greater government involvement and direction. In other words, individuals and organizations were likely to be encouraged to revise the way in which they do business with beneficiaries of the home country. Moreover, while the project appears exploratory in nature, the information on the website really does not tell us what the major goal of the project is.
Additionally, the website says nothing about how the diaspora could or would benefit by collaborating with the government and it gives no assurance that the diaspora would not be forced to cede to the government much of the control that it now exercises over how and where diaspora aid goes. One would have expected that the government would have had substantive discussions and consultations with the diaspora before attempting to launch its project. Checks with some diaspora organizations, including one that currently collaborates with the administration, reveal that no such substantive discussions have taken place, even though some say that they received briefing about the project recently.
Common Thread
To place diaspora aid under the direction of the government would miss the whole point about the value of diaspora aid and its utility to the suppliers of that aid. The common thread running through the diaspora interventions is that they seek to fill a gap that national action either misses or ignores. The government decides on the national priorities that should receive public funding, but when communities feel left out and the diaspora from those communities could help, they step in with some form of assistance. The satisfaction to the suppliers of diaspora aid does not come from knowing that they can support a bias in public policy. Instead, it comes from being able to respond to that bias. Therefore, the government, or anyone else, should not underestimate the satisfaction that Guyanese get from sending that barrel or cash to beneficiaries. Unless the government’s initiative indicates how changing diaspora support would improve opportunities for families and communities, the project was unlikely to have the desired outcome. So, if the administration wants this project to succeed, it must answer the following two questions. Why should members of the diaspora subject to the direction of the administration resources that are already well targeted, and as agreed by all involved in studying diaspora aid, also usually well spent? How to convince suppliers of the aid that the satisfaction they get from sending it would remain unchanged?
Trust and Respect
In addition, two other fundamental points are seemingly underplayed in the current effort to forge a structured relationship with the diaspora. These are trust and respect. An issue that impacts trust is that of corruption. A number of incidents have emerged that either confirms corruption or reinforces the bad feeling that people have about the pervasiveness of corruption in Guyana. What is even more alarming is the apparent indifference by the administration to the allegations of improprieties in the procurement process. This type of attitude only serves to impair trust in the administration. Plenty trust would be needed to convince Guyanese that they should embrace the diaspora project wholeheartedly.
Data on migration from Guyana is spotty but a factor that is often cited in conversations with migrant Guyanese is safety and security. Crime continues to be a major motivating factor for Guyanese to leave the shores. Whether the numbers published by the Bureau of Statistics are complete or not, there is a strong perception among the public that crime is out of control, and has been so for a long time. Many Guyanese also feel that they cannot depend on the police force for protection and on the judicial system to enforce their legal rights.
The diaspora project would have to emerge from under the weight of these concerns to achieve success.
