Third WCD Forum Meeting
25-27 February 2001 - Cape Town, South Africa

Nepal Electricity Authority
Janak L. Karmacharya

The world Commission on Dams secretariat has done a commendable job by accumulating vast wealth of knowledge regarding dams. The experts involved deserve deep appreciation for their contributions. However, a careful selection of candidate dams, not confined to the more-than 25 years old dams, when the concept of environmental and social impacts were yet to be appreciated, for in-depth study could have enhanced the credibility of the analysis Nevertheless the knowledge base is extensive and useful for further study.

2 The Commissioners are to be congratulated for their successful completion of the Report within stipulated timeframe. It is satisfying to note that they have adhered to the universally accepted five core values - equity, efficiency, participatory decision making, sustainability and accountability-that must be applied to decisions related to any development activities and not only for the dam development.

3 The seven strategic priorities may also find acceptance in principle, though not with equal degree of enthusiasm for all the seven priorities. For developing countries, it may not be practically possible to carry out so frequent periodic evaluation. The problem starts when the implementation of these strategies comes up.

4 Let us now go on to the some specific issues regarding the implementation. The requirement that public acceptance should be gained for decision-making is not debatable. However the procedures proposed to achieve this objective is not practicable. To achieve complete public consensus is a mirage, especially in countries, where, using poverty of the population, vested group starts manipulating the largely illiterate population. The creation of a stakeholders forum and intervention by Dispute Review Board/Panel of Experts in case of disagreement with developers to follow the development of a project continuously will lead to interminable discussions and could delay a project to the extent of cancellation .How can the proposal for free, prior and informed consent by indigenous peoples and tribal groups be implemented in a country such as Nepal, where they live cheek by jowl with "ordinary people" How can it be weighted against the preference of other people in the affected areas?

5 As has been suggested by WCD Report, the options assessment seem to be an open ended process, extremely cumbersome and time consuming exercise. For example, the comprehensive options assessment requires that investigation be based on the analysis on a river basin -wide understanding of social, economic and environmental values, requirements, functions and impacts including cumulative impacts.

6 The requirement of comprehensive, integrated, cumulative and adaptive periodic evaluation at interval of 5 to 10 years is neither necessary nor affordable to developing countries Such unnecessary evaluation will divert the rare resources from the new development.

7 The requirement in section 4.1 reads" A basin-wide understanding of the ecosystem's function, values and requirements and how community livelihoods depend on and influence them, is required before decisions on development options are made" is an invitation to the guaranteed postponement of any project, as it takes generation to understand the ecosystem.

8 If entitlements and sharing benefits becomes a part of negotiation process with all affected people, it will be too legalistic process and land in a web of legal procedures, the resolution of which may lie in a prolonged legal battle, diverting the resources from the just beneficiaries. We have been a victim of such long drawn negotiation, where the affected people hiked the demand to unreasonable level thereby postponing the project.

9 The Report's requirement to cerate compliance plans also is an unnecessary burden. Compliance should be under the auspices of relevant government authority and not subject to independent panel review.

10 The requirement that Riparian states be notified of options i.e. should be a party to the option assessment process and agree with procedures for impact assessment is a call for complex situation involving sovereign states. The other problematic proposal is that authority of Independent Panel is put above that of state. Existing treaties between countries should guide the requirements regarding the use of trans-boundary rivers. Other guidelines can not supersede the provisions of such treaties

11 It should be recognized that the procedures for developing any project, more so a dam project with multi-dimensional aspects, are specific to each country. Each country needs to consider its specific conditions, laws and priorities. The guidelines, in order to be acceptable, must accommodate these aspects.

12 Nepal does not have any other means of sizable energy supply, which can be taken as an alternative to the hydro-electricity. All fossil fuels are imported commodities.

About 90% of the energy needs are met with sources of organic origin, which largely includes fuel wood and biomass. With increase energy needs as the population grows, the depleting forest resources are being stressed to the detriment of the environment. The only way to reverse this situation is to develop hydropower.

The nature of the monsoon rain in the area is highly seasonal characterized by more than 80% of the annual rain occurring during the four months of June, July, August and September, and the remaining months falling short of the demand to meet the crop water requirement. All the hydropower projects built in Nepal except the Kulekhani Project are run-off-river type projects. The generation capacity is high during the monsoon season with spill energy but is insufficient to meet the demand during the lean flow season. This situation essentially calls for storage projects to regulate water and meet the peaking energy demand. The need for such regulation will escalate to meet the demands of the growing population for more food and electrical energy.

With more than 40% of the population below the poverty line, Nepal's economy is highly dependent on agriculture, the primary occupation of some 85% its population. Increased agricultural production backed up by reliable year round irrigation facility is, therefore, essential to poverty alleviation and employment generation. In the context of the highly seasonal nature of rainfall and the variability of available water in time and space, this is only possible with dams.

Having been deprived of natural resources of significant economic growth potential other than water, Nepal has viewed the development of its hydropower potential as the only means of the attaining economic prosperity through over all development and the expert of surplus hydro energy to neighboring countries.

When we look the water resources development in sub-regional context, the development of dams in Nepal is seen as the only means to provide water for consumptive uses, clean energy and flood control.

13 The Nepal experience shows that hydropower project did not realize not because the people of the region or people of the country did not like the project , but because some vested interest group did not like it. Arun is the glaring example. A Berkley university study funded by thermal lobby came out against the project to stop its implementation .In figures, the report managed to show the thermal option having slight edge over Arun However, the Report refused to appreciate the impossibility of transporting a train-load of petroleum everyday not for few months or few years but for decades. It also failed to address the uncertainty in importing the fuel through third country .so far the people of the area are concerned , they are still fighting for the revival of the Project. Even today the people of the Arun valley are campaigning for the project. The people of Kali Gandaki were compelled to be so much aggressive to protect the project that they went to the extreme of offering grass to eat to the so called defenders of their interest In the case of Arun, a ten page letter in oxford English opposing the project was sent to the World Bank president on behalf of a so called local inhabitant, who was not understanding a word of what was written on his behalf. Peoples' participation and dissemination of information has been adopted as standard practice during project development. But such dissemination is of use only for those who agree to go through the information. made available to them .In this context, the negotiated way of gaining public acceptance is just a mirage..

14 Hence the need is for the guidelines to accommodate specific conditions of a country to be implementable .I personally believe that there must be a set of guidelines, probably not running into 50 pages, in order to ensure disciplined and smooth execution but not to stall dam project. Poverty alleviation is the paramount concern of civil society and dam construction does contribute towards this.