he term Build Back Better was first coined in Indonesia by the World Bank after the devastating tsunami of 2004 that wreaked havoc on several South-East Asian countries. It is especially relevant to Pakistan today. Later on, during the reconstruction after the earthquake of Central Java in 2006, the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JAICA) put the same concept to work while rebuilding homes. They used earthquake resistant construction techniques and erected more than 100,000 strengthened houses in two years.

The Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction 2015–2030 recorded the term and mentioned the approach under their list of priority of actions. The document reads “enhancing disaster preparedness for effective response and to Build Back Better in recovery, rehabilitation and reconstruction”.

Sindh is now moving from the relief to the recovery and rehabilitation phase. It is high time to make Build Back Better a guiding principle in rehabilitating disaster affected communities. Houses, villages, roads, schools, clinics and other public infrastructure should be designed with this approach to make them climate-, rain- and flood-resilient. Models and guidelines are available in abundance, the wheel need not be reinvented.

The Sindh chief minister recently announced that the flood affected have started returning to their villages, which is why the Sindh government will now focus on supporting them in rebuilding their homes. The government, donors, lenders and the civil society generally discuss houses but little is discussed of destruction on the level of settlements and villages. The concept of Build Back Better should be applied at both the macro- and micro- level i.e. from settlement to household level. If houses are made weather proof but the settlement pattern is not revisited, it will be a flawed approach. Climate proofing of settlements doesn’t merely require infrastructure reconstruction, it should also take into account social re-engineering to make the change sustainable.

If houses are made weather proof but the settlement pattern is not revisited, it will be a flawed approach. Climateproofing of settlements doesn’t merely require infrastructure reconstruction, it should also take into account social re-engineering to make the change sustainable.

The current settlement pattern in rural Sindh evolved under an exploitative feudal system. Zamindars holding large expanses of land employ generational farmers who inherit their loyalty (in fact, a form of slavery) from their forefathers as they are economically controlled by the landed aristocrats. Typically, two or three decades earlier a number of nuclear families would have been assigned to work a tract of land. Since poor farmers are mostly landless and shelter-less, they would have no option but to build a few rickety thatched huts on the piece of land owned by the landlord. It was a win-win situation for both (on the face of it) as farmers got shelter and the landlord had round-the-clock subjects on his farm. Over the decades these nuclear family clusters expanded to a small settlement. Without title to their houses and having no other means of livelihood, these farmers remain at the mercy of their landlords. Being landless, homeless and indebted, these farmers gradually sink into socio-economic slavery in the form of bonded labour. Their meagre income from crops perpetuate their economic and social subjugation. All such under-developed settlements become personal fiefdoms of zamindars where dwellers can’t muster the courage to reject the wishes of the landlord in any situation, from solemnising marriages to casting votes.

A careful analysis of the data provided in the Annual Development Report-2017 from the Sindh Bureau of Statistics sheds light on housing patterns, which are a testimony to rural poverty in Sindh. Taking the example of rural areas of five districts of Sindh that were badly hit by recent floods, housing data depicts abject poverty in these areas. Percentage of kacha houses in rural areas of Dadu (56 percent), Jamshoro (65 percent), KambarShahdkot (65 percent), KhairpurMirs (51 percent) and Mirpurkhas (71 percent) indicates that most of these houses are likely to have been wiped out by floods. In these areas, more than 75 percent houses are one room structures. This shows that most of these people have been rendered completely shelter-less.

Sindh Rural Support Organisation (SRSO) has collected data about settlements in rural Sindh. The data reveals that more than half of the settlements have less than fifty houses. District wise it puts the share of such small settlements in Dadu at 55 percent, Jamshoro at 65 percent, KambarShahdadkot at 65 percent and Khairpur at 58 percent. Finally, in Mirpurkhas, 73 percent of the settlements have less than fifty houses. The tiny size of these settlements will keep them deprived of basic facilities for decades to come. Laying roads and providing services like electricity, education, health and drinking water to large numbers of sparse settlements is not practical for any government. The government of Sindh can rebuild these settlements better by consolidating them into larger villages of 300-500 houses with titles provided to land occupants. This will improve their chance of receiving basic facilities as well as liberate them from the chains of bonded labour. New flood-resilient villages can be established at central locations and connected to farms through paved roads. Soon these villages will become a local market providing commodities and new modes of employment to people. This is an opportunity to build back a better Sindh through a large-scale social reconstruction. The fundamental question is, will the feudal lords allow this to happen?

The writer is a development sector  professional.  Email: nmemon 2004@yahoo.com