Component 4: Project Management and Coordination (US$8.9 million equivalent IDA)

• Day-to-day management needs through Project Management Team (PMT).  Facilitate its operations, coordination and communication, including procurement, financial management, environmental and social safeguards specialists, as well as a diverse range of short-term expertise and annual external audits. Below is the organogram:

• Monitoring and evaluation system and special studies.
• Communications strategy.
• Grievance redress mechanism, which will facilitate timely resolve of program related grievances. It will support a local arrangement for the resolution of grievances and land tenure disputes.
• Incremental operating costs for project management structures that have been established and will be strengthened for project implementation.
• Trainings (long and short term), internships, workshops, meetings and training courses, to enhance longer-term management capacity in the sector and for SVIP management in particular.

Safeguards:

Compensation for Losses:

The Government of Malawi will strive to minimise involuntary displacements and land acquisitions to a limited number. However, land for the construction of the irrigation infrastructure will be acquired and compensated appropriately.

Losses will be compensated in accordance with the laws and policies of Malawi, the World Bank and the African Development Bank. The way in which losses are compensated will be transparent and equitable and be discussed with a large group of stakeholders before the Ministry of Lands, Housing and Urban Development (MOLHUD) will approve the Resettlement Policy Framework and Resettlement Action Plan.

No construction works for the SVTP infrastructure will be commenced until all project-affected persons (PAPs) have been appropriately compensated for property losses.  Any complaints associated with the SVTP will be heard through the normal channels or by the Grievance Redress Committees that the Project has established at Group Village Headman, TA, District and central levels.

Five broad types of losses will be valued and compensated including:

• Land
• Agriculture produce such as crops, fruit trees, plantation crops, flowers
• Physical assets such as buildings and other structures
• Trees
• Access (e.g. water, forest products, grazing areas, watering points, etc.)

People whose buildings will be affected by the main canal will be given a choice of compensation in kind or cash equivalent.  In kind compensation will entail construction of a new house of at least the same quality or better in the same community.   People with land in the canal route and within a wider irrigation block area will get a share in the irrigated block area. People with land in the canal route in areas without irrigation blocks will be compensated for the loss of their land.

People will be compensated for the loss of the produce on their land that cannot be harvested in time and for trees and forests. The valuation of the loss will take into account clearance and preparation of the land and the loss of income during the period until the first harvest.

The design of the irrigation scheme will take into account the access routes of people as well as livestock and wildlife. 

The land required for the irrigation scheme will have to be cleared before construction starts. It is the intention of the Government of Malawi to pay all compensation shortly after the valuation of the losses and before the start of construction works.  

The Government of Malawi engaged a Consultant for the Resettlement Action Plan (RAP) for Main Canal 1 and 2 and compensation payments have been completed. Read the RAP report below:

Grievances and Complaints:

The SVTP will strive to resolve grievances and complaints at the local community level but where this is not possible, the aggrieved person(s) may lodge their grievance with the Grievance Redress Committees nearest to them.  The SVTP has set up Grievance Redress Mechanism committees for the project. The purpose is to solve disputes at the earliest possible time and to provide a clear and timely procedure on how complaints will be received, assessed, resolved and monitored. The SVTP Grievance Redress Mechanism strives to be independent and free of conflict of interest.

Each time a conflict is not resolved the person with a grievance can go to the next level until the grievance is resolved and the case closed. An overview of the process is shown below:

The status of each grievance will be recorded and a list of all grievance cases will be available at the Chikwawa District Irrigation Office and open to public scrutiny.

The people in the Grievance Redress Mechanism Committee have been democratically selected by the people in the project area.  During the establishment of the GRM Committees great effort was made to ensure that those selected were:

• Trusted people within the community
• People with no history of corruption or abuse of public trust
• People with no conflict of interest with other committees/positions

Environmental Safeguards

• The intake is within the Majete Wildlife Reserve. The design and construction methods will minimise the impact on the environment as much as possible. Portions of the canal passing through the Majete Wildlife Reserve will be underground in the form of siphons to allow animals to pass and people to access tourist sites such as Kapichira Falls. Where the canal is open, it will be fenced.  The design is intended to maintain the environmental flow at Kapichira Dam.
• The main irrigation canal for Phase II will pass through a dry area in Lengwe National Park. The design will make it possible for animals to access drinking water and to cross the canal.
• Within the project area there are no known sacred or cultural sites apart from a hill in Phase II. The project design has tried, as much as possible, to avoid going through graveyards.

Click below to read the SVTP ESMP/ESIA