Spotlight on poverty eradication

From spotted pigs to rare trees: how a UN-backed organization in Poland is fighting poverty and saving the environment

by Rebeka Martensen

New York, 21 June -- Gold-speckled swine and ancient fruit orchards may not be the first things that spring to mind when thinking of the global fight against poverty, but in a small village in western Poland, breeding pigs and planting trees are just two ways a United Nations-supported organization has empowered one of the country's most underprivileged populations.

In Chudopczyce, near Poznan, money from a small grants programme run by the UN Development Programme (UNDP) is helping a non-governmental organization train homeless people in the skills they need to survive in a market economy, all the while protecting the environment. Under the motto "The rejected helping the rejected," Barka Mutual Help Foundation organizes group homes where marginalized people work together to meet their basic needs and acquire new skills in construction and farming that enable them to earn a living.

Chudpczyce, Poland

Moving into an abandoned schoolhouse with their two daughters and 30 homeless people they had met in their work in State orphanages, detention centres and psychiatric institutions, Barbara and Thomasz Sadowska renovated the building alongside their new housemates and survived for several years by planting vegetables, raising chickens and receiving hand-outs from local bakers.

As word about Barka spread, more and more desperate people came to their door for help, prompting the housemates to look for other vacant buildings to renovate. In the nearby village of Chudopczyce, they found an ex-government agricultural complex with two decrepit apartment blocks and an equally shabby manor that had been used as an office for the farm. There they launched the second Barka home, starting a process that has since resulted in the establishment of 20 self-help communities.

Rescuing the 'Spotted Zlotniki'

Spotted Zlotniki in Chudopzcyce

The first step in setting up the community in Chudopczyce was finding a way to survive. Like the first home in Wladyslawowo, the new group had no income and was barely able to eke out a living by piecing together small-scale farming activities. A partial solution came from Przemyslaw Czajkowski, "the man who travels through Poland and looks for good environmental projects to find partners for his work," Ms. Sadowska told the UN News Centre. "He's very clever. He visited us many times. He spoke with the people."

Barbara Sadowska and UNDP staff member Helen Stiefel in New York

No more heating bills

Another immediate challenge faced by the group was the cost - both financial and environmental - of heating the apartments. The boiler, a vestige of the 1980s, required 200 tonnes of coal every year and emitted thick clouds of smoke laden with sulfur dioxide, carbon monoxide and soot.

With another grant from UNDP, this time for $40,000, the Barka community was able to rebuild the boiler using a system of bio-mass heating that not only saves money, but reduces air pollution. Burning wood chips donated by the local sawmill and wood waste taken with permission from the forests surrounding Chudopczyce, the new system emits 90 per cent less sulfur dioxide than the previous boiler, 66 per cent less dioxide, 15 per cent less carbon monoxide, 50 per cent less dust and 100 per cent less soot. It also provides the community with free heating, requiring it to cover only the cost of transporting the wood. '

Adding fuel to the new bio-mass boiler .

According to Mr. Czajkowski, the biomass heating project in Chudopczyce has led to an increase in demand from various organizations for funding from donors to implement similar projects throughout Poland. "We cannot overestimate our contribution, but the achievements so far, with a small amount of money, are outstanding," he says.

Protecting Poland's "ancient fruit trees"

With shelter, food and heat, the new "family" in Chudopczyce still lacked a critical necessity -- an occupation. Raising vegetables and tending to farm animals didn't provide enough work for everyone. And many of the younger members of the house were idle and restless.

Through its contact with the Poznan Agriculture Academy and UNDP, Barka received a grant for a third project -- an innovative effort that not only involves the entire community, but protects Poland's disappearing ancient fruit trees. In March 1998, the group grafted 4,000 seedlings with 20 disappearing kinds of apple trees, repeating the action a year later, and also planted over 1,000 cherry trees. By spring 2000, almost 3,000 of the trees had been replanted from nurseries to orchards. Current replants are expected to top that number.The community has even had enough seedlings to give some away to the 130 inhabitants of Chudopczyce - each family has received 2 to 4 young trees to help spread the word about what the group has achieved.

Like the speckled swine, the native trees are resilient to diseases and require no chemical protection. According to UNDP, some of the species had been doomed to extinction prior to the Barka project. "Now there is a real chance for bringing them back to life, and for maintaining the diversity of their genetic characteristics," agency officials say.

Small grants, big results

Although the three UNDP projects in Chudopczyce are small and highly localized, their benefits are significant not only to the local population, but also to the world community: the pig breeding resurrects an endangered species; the new heating system emits cleaner air; and the orchards protect a disappearing type of tree.

This "global reach" is in fact a prerequisite for receiving grants through the Global Environment Facility (GEF), the tripartite system that funds the UNDP programme. Created in 1991 and restructured after the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, the Facility brings together 166 member governments, leading development institutions, the scientific community, the private sector and non-governmental organizations to help implement UN conventions in the areas of climate change, degradation of international waters, ozone depletion and biodiversity loss. UNDP's Small Grants Programme is only one of many ways that GEF funds are channelled towards pro-environment projects.

According to Sarah Timpson, the GEF/SGP's New York-based Global Manager who oversees programmes in 50 countries, the small grants differ in several ways from other UNDP allocations for anti-poverty work. "Our grants go only to non-governmental organizations and community-based organizations and not to governments," she told the UN News Service. "People who are extremely poor often depend on access to natural resources for their livelihoods, and their very survival is threatened by environmental phenomena such as toxic waste. Our grants help address those phenomena, in order to help the poor."

The Programme is rooted in the belief that global environmental problems can best be addressed by involving the people who are directly affected by them. For Mr. Czajkowski, that participation is vital. "What can be more exciting than society's involvement in implementing the biodiversity convention in their family gardens and orchards?" he says.

Since it was established in 1992, the Small Grants Programme has received over $42 million from the Global Environment Facility, and has provided an equal amount of matching funds. The Programme has funded over 2,000 projects in Africa, the Middle East, Asia, Latin America, the Caribbean and Europe. In Poland, grants totalling $600,000 will be made this year alone.

Governments and civil society: creating stronger partnerships

The story of UNDP's aid to Barka is only one of thousands of ways that the UN system is empowering non-profit organizations to help people in need, in response to a call by Secretary-General Kofi Annan to boost partnerships between governments and non-governmental actors. "By now we know that peace and prosperity cannot be achieved without partnerships involving Governments, international organizations, the business community and civil society," the Secretary-General has said. "In today's world, we depend on each other."

In a milestone declaration made at the Millennium Summit in New York in October 2000, heads of State and Government from around the world resolved to "develop strong partnerships with the private sector and with civil society organizations in pursuit of development and poverty eradication." Barka's story illustrates how such partnerships - using minimal funds - are able to help people in ways that neither a government or a non-governmental organization could do on its own.

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